Can you find the obituaries for my great grandparents?  They were
William McClelland HAMILTON who died 9 July 1917 in Hyattsville,
Prince George County, MD, and his wife (Nancy) Maud (Smith) HAMILTON
who died 2 March 1930, also in Hyattsville.

A bit of added information: William was born in Indiana, 26 Feb 1866
to William and Martha HAMILTON.  Maud, who always used her middle
name, was born in Kentucky, 5 July 1862, to James Gray SMITH & and
Tommie ALLEN. They had only one child, Arthur Gray HAMILTON.

I am applying to the DAR and have found nothing to document William
and Maud's birth dates, except censuses.  I am hoping obits will
contain their birth dates.  Even if they don't, I'll be happy to have
you locate them.  Good luck and thanks for searching!

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Clarification of Question by orazio-ga on 07 Jan 2004 21:31 PST

Hyattsville is just outside of Washington, DC.  In fact, William M.
Hamilton worked for the Bureau of Engraving in DC.  Anyway, I've been
told it's quite possible that the Hamiltons' obits could be in The
Washington Post or The Washington Star.

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Clarification of Question by orazio-ga on 07 Jan 2004 21:32 PST

William's nickname was "Mac".

You've probably seen this already, but I'll post it:

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~swilson/livingstone/hamilton.htm

Bowler-ga

http://newsarch.rootsweb.com/th/read/KYBOURBO/2002-12/1039277804

Thanks, Bowler-ga.  It was nice of you to post those.  I know
"Valenti" who was the source for the first one and who also posted the
second one.  Unfortunately, "Valenti" didn't have obits for these two.
 I hope you find something.  Good luck!

orazio-ga

I've discovered in order to find an obituary you need to do the following:

1) Identify which newspaper(s) the obituary may be in.  (which you
seem to have done).

2) Identify which libraries or instituions own the newspaper for the
time the obituary may have appeared.  (a researcher can provide this
information)

3) Find an institution near to you (a reseacher can help with this)

4) If the library is not local you can request through interlibrary
loan a copy of the obit.  Libraries sometimes are willing to check a
three day span (at least my local library is) for the obituary.  You
must give them the span of days.

5) If the obit is not in the newspaper, try to identify other papers
the obit may have appeared and repeat the process.

Now, I'm not volunteering other reseachers to do any of this.  They do
however have first choice to this question and I know many of them can
provide the availability as easily as I can.  I would be willing to
check the availability of the newspaper for you and provide links,
phone numbers to those libraries if you need.  I'm not an "official"
researcher (not for lack of want) but let me know if I can help you
with any of the above.

Bowler-ga

Thanks, Bowler-ga.  I realized I could check The Washington Post
myself, but no luck there. Thank you so much for all your good ideas. 
Let's wait and see if anyone comes up with an answer for me.  Looking
through the Post made me think a little Maryland neighborhood
newspaper might be a more likely place to find their obits.  Don't
know if they existed though......

Orazio-ga