News for Immediate Release
Oct. 28,
2014
Harrisburg
- More than seven
million Pennsylvania death records are now available online thanks to a
continued collaboration between the Pennsylvania State Archives and Ancestry.
This
collection is located at www.ancestry.com.
It contains all of the publicly available death records from the Pennsylvania
State Archives from 1906 until 1963. Ancestry will add new records as they
become publicly available.
Genealogists
and the general public often turn to death records to track down family
history, discover places of burial and investigate medical conditions and
diseases.
Free access
to the records is available to Pennsylvania residents. Access requires a free Ancestry.com
Pennsylvania account. Once their account is set up, visitors may
search the state’s collection of death certificates by name, birth date, death
date, life event and gender.
Instructions
for creating an account are available at www.PAStateArchives.com.
Since
April, Ancestry has already made available nearly 5 million Pennsylvania death
certificates ranging from 1906 to 1944 on its website. Currently, the new
database makes up 5 percent of all deaths searched on the website.
This
collection is a culmination of nearly three years of work, which began shortly
after Gov. Tom Corbett signed Act 110 in December 2011. That allowed access to
death records after 50 years and birth records after 105 years.
The
Pennsylvania State Archives is an important resource for scholars, historians,
genealogists, and the public. The primary function of the Pennsylvania State
Archives, part of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, is to
acquire, preserve and make available for study the permanently valuable public
records of the Commonwealth, with particular attention given to the records of
state government. In fulfilling its general responsibility for the preservation
of historic documents, the State Archives also collects private papers relevant
to Pennsylvania history.
The
Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission is the official history agency of
the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Visit the commission online at www.phmc.state.pa.us.
Media
Contact: Howard
Pollman, 717-705-8639
###