Reformation Heritage Books Index of Death and Other Notices Appearing in the Cincinnati Freie Presse, 1874-1920

The “Cincinnati Freie Presse was a newspaper published in German from 1874 until 1964 for German speaking immigrants of Cincinnati. The Freie Presse, which means ‘free press,’ was a daily paper…it contained local and national news, as well as news from Europe. The paper [also] contained many advertisements of local merchants, and announcements of interest to the local German community.” These death notices are very useful to family researchers since, before 1906, death certificates were not required by the state of Ohio. In addition, death notices frequently contain more information than certificates. While a certificate generally gave name, age, address, place of burial, and county of birth; a death notice often gave these as well as: the name of surviving spouse, the maiden name of the deceased or surviving spouse, the names of surviving children, and the city of birth (and sometimes a person’s status of wealth or an unusual cause of death); and, in the case of a child’s death: the names of both parents (including the mother’s maiden name) and the names of siblings. This major compilation contains the name, date of death (if published) and date of notice, age of person, the newspaper page on which the notice was printed, maiden names for married women, and the city of birth, if mentioned. The index contains the names of over 38,000 people who died between 1874 and 1920. Both the original German spelling of a name, and its English equivalent are given when available. Words frequently found in death notices are given in a list in both English and German.