Society of Professional Obituary Writers Reorganization, Conference and Awards

The Society of Professional Obituary Writers (SPOW) is taking a hiatus from hosting a conference and handing out awards for obit writing for 2012 during the group’s reorganization.

SPOW Awards honoring obituary work published in 2011 will be presented along with awards for obits published in 2012 during the 2013 SPOW Conference at a location to be determined.

SPOW seeks to elect a new director, revamp its website and make the organization more relevant in the changing world of journalism.

Interested SPOW members, associate members and friends are invited to participate in the reorganization, recommend director candidates and volunteer for various duties by contacting current director Alana Baranick at alana.baranick@obitwriters.org.

Woman's paid obit neglects to mention pertinent detail: She killed five people.

A North Carolina newspaper explains why it published a paid obituary that neglected to mention the deceased's responsibility for a shooting rampage. Includes links to news stories.

'This American Life' Seeks Obit Suggestions

The New York Times Magazine has invited the radio program "This American Life" to guest edit its end-of-the-year obituaries issue called "The Lives They Lived." For this year's issue, The Times Magazine is looking to broaden the scope of the people featured, focusing less on notable people and more on those who died, but received little media attention.

"We're looking for stories, anecdotes, suggestions about people who have died this year that are particularly personal, emotional, unbelievable, extraordinary. These stories can be told by friends or relatives, business associates or casual acquaintances. They can even be told by the deceased people themselves, if archival tape, interviews or memoirs exist. They don't have to be long or epic -– the story isn’t supposed to tell their whole life –- but it'd be great if they're emotional or surprising and evocative of the featured person in some way. In particular, we'd love stories or suggestions about soldiers who have passed away, firefighters or police officers. Beloved teachers and the big turning points in their lives, or just one amazing teachable moment they nailed. Politicians? Town eccentrics? Someone who died who lived a great love story. A child who died. Also, anyone who left a particularly charming or extensive or simply mindblowing instructions for their memorial service."

Send pitches/links to Julie Snyder, senior producer of "This American Life."

Quote of the Day

"I still use a manual typewriter (a 1953 Underwood portable, in a robin’s-egg blue) because the soft pip-pip-pip of the typing of keys on a computer keyboard doesn’t quite fit with my sense of what writing sounds like. I need the hard metal clack, and I need those keys to sometimes catch so I can reach in and untangle them, turning my fingertips inky. Without slapping the return or turning the cylinder to release the paper with a sharp whip, without all that minor havoc, I feel I’ve paid no respect to the dead. What good is an obituary if it can be written so peaceably, so undisturbingly, in the dark of night?" --From "The Coffins of Little Hope" by Timothy Schaffert

The Geography of Loss

Patti Digh, author of "Life Is a Verb" and "What I Wish For You," is writing a book called "The Geography of Loss." She's also launched a Tumblr blog to highlight the answers of people around the world to one simple question:

For what or for whom do you grieve?

Personally, I grieve for my best friend, my grandmother, my cats (Princess, Sox, Eastman and Mystery), my high school sweetheart and some of the many people I've covered on the death beat. What about you?

PJ O'Rourke proposes vindictive pre-obits

I can remember when PJ O'Rourke was maybe the funniest writer in the country, when he edited National Lampoon, when he wrote stuff like High Speed Performance Characteristics of Pickup Trucks.

Sadly his work has declined to things like this predictable litany in which he wishes his political enemies dead. It's the usual suspects and there's nothing creative about it and it would be just as bad if his enemies happened to be conservatives. PJ became so partisan that he ate his brain, as well as his bilious good humor.

NYTimes Crossword Puzzle mentions in death notices

I'm a NYTimes crossword fan and a NYTimes death notice reader, and it's funny how these two obsessions manage to meet every now and then.

Today it is Mildred Swartsberg, who died at 99 and "had a passion for all the arts, sports and The New York Times crossword puzzle. She was great at anything she tried."

I'd hardly choose to be remembered for my devotion to the Sunday crossword - my spaghetti aglio et olio would be a better keepsake. Still today's death notice crossword mention set me to wondering how often the crossword pops up in death notices.

Nexis reveals that it is an astonishing 238 times since 1997, more than once a month. The pioneer was the redoubtable Bertha Newman, an accountant who was remembered as "a voracious reader, a devotee of The New York Times cross word puzzle, a woman of inspired conversation, a deeply caring friend, and a person who never lost her passionate love for the cultural life of this city."

Nor have I!!

The end of the story

The Toronto Star's public editor describes the circumstances in getting an obituary of Canada's Opposition leader on the web within 20 minutes of his death.

Missing survivors

John Millican died on June 11. To honor his partner of 10 years, Terrance James filled out the paperwork for an obituary notice in the Batesville Daily Guard. But when the obit ran five days later, James was not listed as a survivor. Instead the notice featured the names of Millican's deceased parents, and his three siblings, with whom he had little contact.

When questioned about the omission, Pat Jones, the Arkansas newspaper's general manager, told the blog Queerty: "It’s not a gay thing. We don’t list unmarried couples, in-laws, or pets in the free obituaries."

Boston Skycap

Here's a sweet everyman type obit via Marquard

Not Your Grandma's Obit

Ellen McGarr excelled at quitting, and hers is a livelier read than the usually dry family-placed death notices. http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/idahostatesman/obituary.aspx?n=ellen-mcgarr&pid=150429149&fhid=10163
Please note that the comment about dark meat in her chicken salad is as much a myth as all Southerners drink sweet tea.

NYTimes runs 112-year-old obit correction

Not just the oldest but among the longest cx I've ever seen, and really interesting.

Pawlenty's announcement appears on obits page

In Pioneer Press of all places

Jim Sheeler, Roy Peter Clark and Mallory Tenore chat about stories of life and death

Jim Sheeler

Did you miss the realtime online chat featuring Jim Sheeler (Pulitzer Prize winner, Case Western Reserve University professor), Roy Peter Clark (Poynter) and Mallory Tenore (Poynter) mentioned in the previous post by Jade Walker?

You can still check out what was covered by visiting the Poynter chat on How to Report & Write Stories of Life, Death.

Live chat: How to report & write stories about life & death

Jim Sheeler, who won the Pulitzer Prize for his “Final Salute” series, and writing coach Roy Peter Clark will chat about writing stories of life and death today at 3 p.m. ET. Click here to participate in the conversation. Twitter users can also ask questions ahead of time using the hashtag #poyntertweets.

Lieutenant-Colonel Jeffery Williams (1920-2011)

A swell obituary in The Telegraph of a Canadian military historian who was the last member of the paper's obituarists to have served in the Second World War.

The 2011 Grimmies, a.k.a. Society of Professional Obituary Writers Awards, Have Been Presented

And the winners are:

Larken Bradley

The 2011 SPOW Lifetime Achievement in Obituary Writing Award was presented to Larken Bradley, who writes obits for the West Marin Citizen in the San Francisco area and does custom obits for clients, at an awards luncheon at Poynter Institute in St. Petersburg, Fla., on May 13, 2011. Her website is: http://obituarywriters.com/.

The list of official SPOW Award recipients are as follows:

Best Body of Work in Obituary Writing (Long Form): Philip Fine, Globe and Mail.

Best Body of Work in Obituary Writing (Short Form): Maureen O'Donnell, Chicago Sun Times.

Best Obit about an Internationally Known Figure: Sandra Martin, Globe and Mail, for her Jackie Burroughs obit.

Best Obituary Tribute: Tom Hawthorn, Globe and Mail, for his Gene Kiniski obit.

Best Obituary (Short Form) about a Well-Known Regional Figure: Maureen O'Donnell, Chicago Sun Times, for her Joseph Sterling obit.

Best Obituary (Long Form) about a Well-Known Regional Figure: Amy Rabideau Silvers, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, for her Lorrie Otto obituary.

Best Obituary (Short Form) about an Average Joe: Amy Rabideau Silvers, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, for her Evelyn Fefer obituary.

Best Obituary (Long Form) about an Average Joe: Andrew Meacham, St. Petersburg Times, for his Neal Alan Smith obit.

Winners of the People's Picks, an online poll that is open to the public but has no bearing on the outcome of the official Grimmies judging, are:

Body of Work (Long Form): Ron Csillag, Globe and Mail;

Body of Work (Short Form): Mark Zaborney, Toledo Blade.

Internationally Known Figure: Dave Hoekstra, Chicago Sun Times, for his Solomon Burke obit.

Best Obituary Tribute: Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun Times, for his Tony Curtis obituary.

Best Obituary (Long Form) about an Average Joe: Ron Csillag, Globe and Mail, for his Fred Huffman obit.

Best Obituary (Short Form) about an Average Joe: Maureen O'Donnell, Chicago Sun Times, for her obituary for The DeMuros.

Best Obituary (Long Form) about a Well-Known Regional Figure: Maureen O'Donnell, Chicago Sun Times, for her Jim Cole obit.

Best Obituary (Short Form) about a Well-Known Regiona Figure: Maureen O'Donnell, Chcago Sun Times, for her Joe Vito obituary.

Legacy.com announces partnership with Society of Professional Obituary Writers to showcase obits for everyday people

Press release from Legacy.com:

LEADING MEMORIAL SITE PARTNERS WITH OBITUARY WRITERS TO SPOTLIGHT OBITS FOR “ORDINARY” PEOPLE

With help from the Society of Professional Obituary Writers, Legacy.com shares newspaper obituaries for teachers, homemakers and others

EVANSTON, Ill. – There’s no shortage of places to read the life stories of celebrities like Elizabeth Taylor and Michael Jackson. But too often the obituaries of less well-known people go unnoticed. A new feature launched by online memorial leader Legacy.com seeks to change that by highlighting obituaries for ordinary people who led extraordinary lives – or who simply had exceptionally interesting obituaries.

Through a newly-formed partnership with the Society of Professional Obituary Writers, Legacy.com – which hosts the obituary sections of 900-plus newspapers in the United States and around the world – is showcasing stories not only of movie stars and pop singers, but also of teachers, restaurant servers, homemakers and more.

“We’re delighted to share with our millions of users some of the amazing life stories that are published in newspapers every day,” said Legacy.com President and CEO Stopher Bartol. “By combining our resources with those of the nation’s leading obituary writers, we not only drive traffic to newspaper obituaries, but also help satisfy the appetite of readers for interesting stories and the desire by families for their loved ones’ legacies to be remembered.”

Examples include:
*A devoted married couple who died four days apart, 65 years after they first met.
*A schoolteacher who, at 98, recalled the names of students she had taught half a century earlier. (They remembered her, too.)
*A popular parking meter prosecutor. (Yes, you read that right.)

The highlighted obituaries, regularly added to a Legacy.com blog called The Obit Report that links to the newspaper where the obituary was originally published, are often inspirational – and occasionally funny.

For example, the family of Rose Davis provided a lighthearted accounting of her birth and life, as well as their eventual reunion with her in heaven: We miss you dearly and know that we'll meet again. But, not too soon.

The Obit Report initiative was partly the result of a report by the Medill School of Journalism that found “people interested in obituaries – compelling stories about noteworthy lives – are a sizeable, highly engaged potential audience.”

“The Medill team zeroed in on the fact that people enjoy reading stories about people, whether they’re famous or not,” Bartol said, noting that obituaries are among the most visited sections of newspapers. “Given that Legacy.com publishes thousands of newspaper obituaries each day and SPOW is comprised of award-winning journalists who are passionate about obituaries, the partnership positions us well to identify great content and share it with a broader audience.”

Said Alana Baranick, SPOW director: “The Society of Professional Obituary Writers is delighted that Legacy.com has made The Obit Report a forum on which to spotlight obits about ordinary people who lived extraordinary lives. We're sharing life stories that are beautifully or cleverly written by professional journalists as well as family-prepared obits that capture our attention for a variety of reasons.”

The Obit Report is currently available at www.legacy.com and via Legacy.com’s Facebook page.

ABOUT LEGACY.COM
Founded in 1998, Legacy.com is the world’s most timely and comprehensive resource for online obituaries and the undisputed leader in Web-based memorialization. With 18 million unique visitors each month, the Legacy.com domain is among the 100 most visited on the Internet.

Legacy.com’s network includes thousands of newspapers and funeral homes in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Ireland and Australia. By making interactive memorial content accessible directly via the websites of newspapers and funeral homes, Legacy.com helps people expand the ways in which they can express condolences and share remembrances of loved ones. A privately held company, Legacy.com is headquartered in Evanston, Ill.

ABOUT SPOW
The Society of Professional Obituary Writers is a group of journalists who write, produce and present obituaries for newspapers and other news entities. SPOW spotlights the art of obituary writing while helping obituary writers improve their craft.

NYTimes obit writer talks about Bin Laden obit

Sounds like it was barely updated over a decade ... I bet this isn't one of those where the subject cooperates.

People's Picks and the Grimmies (SPOW Awards) will be announced May 13

at an awards luncheon at Poynter Institute in St. Petersburg, Fla., during the 2011 Society of Professional Obituary Writers Conference.

For conference details, visit our conference page.