Franklin County, Ohio
Funeral Homes ~ Mortuaries ~ Undertakers
Today & Yesterday

Vital records are an important part of genealogy, but few states began requiring birth and death certification until early in the twentieth century.  Ohio passed a law requiring that all births and deaths be recorded at the county level beginning in 1867 (an earlier, similar law had proved worthless).  In some counties compliance with the 1867 law was sporadic, and many counties had fires that destroyed records.  Franklin County researchers are fortunate in that most births and deaths were recorded.  However, Franklin County suffered a devastating courthouse fire during the night of January 31-February 1, 1879 and many records were destroyed or damaged.  Most birth and death records survived, but some are very difficult to read.  Those records were kept in large ledgers and each entry covers one line written across two pages.  In 1908 Ohio passed a law requiring that births and deaths be registered with the State Department of Health and beginning 20 December 1908 the law went into effect.

But what of those who were born before birth registration was required? What of those whose date of death, though it occurred after 20 December 1908, is unknown? The local funeral home was often the only repository of the information regarding a person's birth and death, or it is the best place to learn the date of death so that a certificate of death can be sought.  A large part of Franklin County's rich history can be found in dusty filing cabinets, basements and attics of the county's many funeral homes.  So on this page I will try to provide the Franklin County, Ohio researcher with a way to locate some of the old funeral home records.

A word to the wise:  When contacting a funeral home regarding information about your ancestor try to follow a few simple rules:

• Remember the funeral home's primary business is to serve the bereaved families that contact them daily.
• Do not phone them unless you plan to visit in person and want to set up an appointment.
• Write a brief courteous letter asking for precise information about one or two people--do not include your pedigree, family group sheet or a biography of Great-grandfather MYANCESTOR.
• Never write a letter asking for "all the information you have on the MYANCESTOR family."  The MYANCESTOR family might be an uncommon name where you are, but there might be hundreds of people by that name in the funeral home records--families tend to use the same funeral home for generations.
• Always send a #10 (business size) self-addressed, stamped envelope (SASE) and be sure to inquire if there is a fee for the information.
• Last, but not least:  Be courteous, be willing to wait several weeks for a response, send a thank you note, or at the very least, thank them for their time and assistance in your original request.