Michiganology.org Website is Up But ... Be Patient While Records are Added to Site

We just checked and the Archives of Michigan's new website, Michiganology.org is up and running. But it is going to take a bit of time to find our way around this "new land" and for everything to be moved to this new site.

You can find a general outline of the moving plan here.

The 1943 death records are there so if you have been waiting ... "patiently," right? ... they are now waiting for you to find them.

You can find a link to view the 1943 collection at the bottom of the home page. (Or by going to Research, Family History Vital Records.) It takes you to a basic search interface. If you search right away (using a surname) it will search all the subcollections aka counties. If you first select/open a particular county folder, then the basic search will only search that county. You can change the results list from listing just 18 to 36 or 54 entries/results. The surname search for this death year picks up a surname from at least the decedent or parental names entered on the certificate.

We tried searching using just a surname. We tried searching a first name and surname. Both worked. However, if you do surname search at this time you can not refine it by then adding/refining a first name. You need to do a New Search and put both the first name and surname in together.

Also, observed is the "New Search" link at the top of the results page did not always work. So one way to go back is to select 1943 from the path listing at the top of the search interface.

Want to browse? Once you select a county you can browse the records, starting by selecting the A-M or N-Z folder. Then use the results pages to scroll thru the surnames (decedents) presented until you find what you seek.

When we figure out the best approach we'll let you know. After poking around some, below are some observations.

We tried starting at browse Collections to see what is currently already there. You will find death certificates under the Disease Control, Records and Statistics Division. Clicking on that takes you to the Death Records Search. But it comes up with "No Results Found." Why? Because the older, previously released digitized death certificates will be moving to the new website during September so until they are moved you need to still use SeekingMichigan.org to look for these earlier death certificates and any other records that have not made the transition yet.

The Advanced Search of this website's search engine interface is a bit different than that at SeekingMichigan. Currently only the collection Main Streets is searchable under Advanced by Collection where you can use collection specific search parameters. When we figure out the best use of the Advanced Custom Search we will let you know but we are going to have to wait for more records to arrive.

Have fun searching the 1943 Michigan Death Certificates!

See you soon at Mt. Clemens Public Library!
LE