Death in Context 2: Exploring Health, Funerals, Mourning, and Memorial Landscapes in America

The first course in this series, Death in Context: Exploring Records, Burial Practices, and Memorial Landscapes in America (part 1), examined the records, cemeteries, and material culture that document death, providing students with a foundation for researching and interpreting the end of an ancestor’s life. Building upon that foundation, this second course expands beyond traditional genealogical sources to examine the broader historical and cultural context of health, death, funerals, burial practices, memorial landscapes, and remembrance in America.

Through an interdisciplinary approach that draws upon social history, material culture, and the history of medicine, students will explore topics not typically included in genealogical research and consider why they are essential to understanding the lives of past generations. By placing records within their historical context, participants will gain new perspectives on the experiences that shaped their ancestors’ final days, the customs surrounding death and mourning, and the communities in which they lived.

The goal of this course is to provide an in-depth exploration of death, burial, and mourning that enables researchers to move beyond just documenting an ancestor’s death toward interpreting its historical significance. Students will leave with a richer understanding of the people, places, and practices that surrounded death, allowing them to craft more complete, nuanced, and historically grounded family histories.

Week 1: February 18 Introduction

Talking About the End at the Beginning: Why Study Death and What to Consider. 4:00-5:15pm
Gena Philibert-Ortega

As we begin this second course on the study of death, we will first consider the breadth of topics encompassed by death studies and their relevance to family history research. Death is more than a single event recorded on a certificate; it provides insight into an ancestor’s health, the circumstances surrounding death, the ways death was documented, burial practices, memorialization, and the cultural traditions that shaped each of these experiences. This introductory session will examine the many avenues’ genealogists can pursue when researching and interpreting death-related records and material culture. It will also serve as an opportunity to identify potential research questions and writing topics, encouraging participants to think critically and creatively about how the study of death can deepen our understanding of our ancestors’ lives and the communities in which they lived.

Coroners and Medical Examiners: The Study of Death and the Records Left Behind. 5:45-7:00pm
Gena Philibert-Ortega

Coroners and medical examiners play a critical role in investigating sudden, unexpected, suspicious, and unattended deaths, yet their histories, responsibilities, and records are  overlooked by researchers. In this presentation, we will examine the origins and evolution of the coroner and medical examiner systems in the United States, highlighting the legal, medical, and historical distinctions between these two professions. We will explore how death investigations are conducted and the types of records they generate. Participants will learn where these records can be found (when available), the information they may contain, and how they can provide valuable evidence for reconstructing an ancestor’s life, death, and the circumstances surrounding their final days.

Week 2: February 25 Health

20th Century Public Health and your Ancestors: Saving Lives Along the Way. 4:00-5:15pm
Lori Lyn Price

This session highlights the major U.S. public health initiatives of the early to mid-1900s that directly influenced the lives of past generations. We will explore improvements in maternal and infant care, the rise of vaccines and antimicrobial treatments, and campaigns targeting infectious, venereal, and nutrition-related diseases. The talk also examines how racial minorities, rural families, and the poor experienced these reforms differently—and how these disparities may appear in your ancestors’ records and life stories.

Mental Health Through the Centuries: Did your Ancestor Experience It? 5:45-7:00pm
Lori Lyn Price

This presentation follows the history of mental health in America—from early colonial views to modern approaches—and how these shifts affected ordinary people. We’ll look at evolving theories, treatments, and institutions, as well as how mental-health-related deaths were recorded. Genealogists will gain practical strategies and sources for uncovering the stories of ancestors who lived with mental health conditions

Week 3: March 4 Funeral

Undertakers, Funeral Directors, and Funeral Homes: An American History. 4:00-5:15pm
Gena Philibert-Ortega

Funeral homes serve as a bridge between families, communities, and the rituals surrounding death. This lecture traces the evolution of the American funeral home from the nineteenth-century to the modern funeral establishment, examining the social, cultural, technological, and professional changes that transformed the care of the dead. We will explore the rise of embalming, the emergence of funeral directing as a profession, the development of funeral homes as community institutions, and the changing customs that shaped funeral practices throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. 

Funeral Home Records: An Advanced Guide for Genealogists. 5:45-7:00pm
Gena Philibert-Ortega

Funeral home records are among the most underutilized sources available to genealogists, often preserving details that cannot be found in death certificates, obituaries, or cemetery records. This lecture examines the history of funeral home recordkeeping and the wide variety of records created during the course of arranging a funeral. Participants will learn why these records were created, what information they typically contain, and where surviving collections may be found in archives, historical societies, libraries, family-owned funeral homes and private collections. The presentation will also explore research strategies for locating records that have been transferred, lost, or preserved in unexpected repositories. Through record examples, attendees will gain the knowledge needed to interpret funeral home records as rich genealogical sources that illuminate family relationships, migration, religious affiliation, occupation, military service, and the social and economic circumstances surrounding an ancestor’s death.

Week 4: March 11 Funeral

Funeral Cards as Genealogical Evidence: Reconstructing Families, Faith, and Community. 4:00-5:15pm
Bonnie Wade Mucia

Funeral cards are among the most personal yet underutilized sources available to genealogists. Often preserved in family Bibles, drawers, or boxes of keepsakes, these memorials document far more than a death. They may identify family relationships, religious affiliation, military service, fraternal organizations, ethnic identity, and the social networks that connected individuals within their communities.

This advanced session explores the history and evolution of funeral cards, particularly within the Catholic tradition, and demonstrates how they can be analyzed as genealogical evidence rather than simply family mementos.

Participants will learn how to extract genealogically significant information from these artifacts and use the evidence they contain to identify additional records, including parish registers, obituaries, death certificates, cemetery records, military files, and organizational records. By treating funeral cards as evidence rather than souvenirs, researchers can uncover relationships and historical context that may not appear in traditional genealogical sources.

Food, Fellowship, and Farewell: Funeral Meals in American History. 5:45-7:00pm
Gena Philibert-Ortega

Food has long played an essential role in the rituals surrounding death, providing comfort to the bereaved while reinforcing family, religious, and community bonds. This lecture explores the history of funeral food in the United States, tracing the evolution of mourning meals from early American funeral biscuits and post-burial gatherings to the potluck dinners and church suppers familiar today. 

Participants will examine how ethnicity, religion, region, and social class shaped funeral food traditions and how these customs reflected changing attitudes toward death, hospitality, and remembrance. The presentation will also consider the role of community and fundraising cookbooks, newspaper columns, church publications, and family recipe collections in preserving these traditions and documenting the everyday lives of our ancestors. By viewing funeral food through the lens of social history, attendees will gain a deeper appreciation for how meals prepared in times of mourning reveal family relationships, cultural identity, community networks, and the lived experiences of past generations.

Week 5: March 18 Mourning

Adorning Grief: A History of Mourning Jewelry, Ribbons & Tokens. 4:00-5:15pm
Amy Urman

This presentation will discuss physical memorials to the dead across cultures and eras.  We will learn about the history of mourning artifacts from ancient times to current including the stages and etiquette of Victorian Mourning.  This presentation will highlight items worn on fingers, around the neck, woven from hair, and pinned to lapels

Battlefield to Cemetery: An Overview of American Civil War Deaths, Memory, & Research. 5:45-7:00pm
Sarah Kay Bierle

What happened to Civil War soldiers who died? How were their families informed? Where were they buried? This presentation will walk through these solemn moments, examine the establishment of National Cemeteries and Confederate Cemeteries, and overview some records that are helpful for researching an ancestor’s Civil War fate or burial place. Additionally, this presentation will include research examples and cemetery case studies from Winchester National Cemetery and Stonewall Cemetery in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley.

Week 6: March 25 Mourning

How We Mourn: The Art and Material Culture of Death in America, 1700 to present. 4:00-5:15pm
Elise Ciregna

This lecture will focus on the art and material culture (“stuff”) around rituals of death, burial and grief throughout American history. Beyond obvious markers of death such as gravestones, what other elements signify mourning when a loved one has died? What comforting objects or rituals do we turn to when we are bereaved? What kinds of art do we commission or create? We will explore the fascinating ways we cope with death in our personal lives. 

Cemeteries, Casework, and Coming Home: Advanced Genealogy in Military Repatriation. 5:45-7:00pm
Bonnie Wade Mucia

Military repatriation is more than just research—it’s a journey of return. In this advanced session, we explore how genealogists contribute to the identification and reburial of WWII soldiers, many originally interred in overseas cemeteries or mass graves at camps like Cabanatuan POW camp in the Philippines. See how genealogical casework culminates in meaningful reinterments at national cemeteries across the U.S., bringing peace to families and honoring the legacy of service.

Week 7: April 1 Cemetery

The Lustrous Stone: Marble in the American Cemetery, 1780-1880. 4:00-5:15pm
Elise Ciregna

The development of domestic American white marble quarries in Vermont in the 1780s presaged the end of the use of slate for gravestones. Slate had been the preferred medium for gravestones since the earliest Colonialists started marking graves. The fine white marble of Carrara, Italy was prized by wealthy Americans, but once white marble became available domestically and within reach of ordinary citizens, marble quickly replaced slate as the medium of choice for grave markers. The properties of marble that allowed it to be carved “in the round” opened a new vision for gravestones and monuments and their creation in an endless variety of sculptural shapes and motifs. This new vocabulary of expression saw its peak during the nineteenth century with the advent of the rural cemetery movement.

From Jamestowne to Plimoth: Unearthing the Burial Customs of America’s Earliest Settlers. 5:45-7:00pm
Bonnie Wade Mucia

What insights can archaeology provide when historical records are silent? This session investigates the burial customs of Jamestown and Plimoth by combining archaeology, forensic science, and historical research. Attendees will analyze aspects such as burial sites, skeletal remains, grave contexts, artifacts, DNA, isotope analysis, and historical documents to reconstruct the lives and deaths of America’s earliest English settlers. Through various archaeological case studies, the presentation highlights how different types of evidence are examined, linked, and interpreted to answer questions about identity, health, social status, kinship, religion, and circumstances. Participants will come away with a better understanding of how archaeological findings complement documentary sources, enriching our knowledge of colonial families and communities.

Week 8: April 8 Cemetery 

The Business of Burying: An Overview of Cemeteries in the US. 4:00-5:15pm
Elise Ciregna

Cemeteries are, for many of us, sites of mystery, grounds belonging to those who lived in the past. In this talk I will demystify these American landscapes of death, exploring their role as vital, evolving, and organic spaces that have historically and contemporarily been important places for the living. We will consider burial grounds throughout history, from their beginnings as community spaces to the present, in which most cemeteries are part of a widespread for-profit industry. We will explore the different types of cemeteries you might encounter in your genealogical work. I will also touch briefly on the cemetery today as a public space for community engagement and celebration.

Houses of Memory: The Story of American Mausoleums. 5:45-7:00pm 
Gena Philibert-Ortega

Mausoleums are among the most architecturally significant, yet least studied burial places. This lecture examines the development of mausoleums in the United States, tracing their evolution to their widespread adoption during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We will explore the cultural, religious, and social influences that shaped the construction of private family mausoleums, receiving vaults, community mausoleums, and other forms of above-ground burial. The presentation will also examine architectural styles, symbolism, materials, and inscriptions as expressions of changing attitudes toward death, remembrance, and commemoration. 

Week 9: April 15 Telling the Story

Talking & Writing about the Dead & Death. 4:00-5:15pm 
Darcie Hind Posz

Working backwards, we will create a story of our ancestor by beginning at their end. This tutorial and discussion will focus on the many facets of death and the dead: from blind spots, processing emotions, barriers we create after a death, and how to balance mourning with analysis, correlation, documentation, and clear writing. Exercises will be in approachable steps as we work back in time. While a death is the end of a timeline, it is the beginning of a genealogist’s work. Talking to the living about the dead will also be discussed.

How Historians Research: The Historian’s Toolbox. 5:45-7:00pm
Elise Ciregna

Genealogists use specific tools and ways of accessing information in their work. Similarly, in their work of decoding or interpreting the past, historians use a myriad of techniques or ways to flesh out the puzzle of the past they are researching. This session will address a number of different scenarios of “fact finding” and ways of answering historical research questions. If possible, provide questions or current challenges ahead of time for possible resolution or discussion and creative problem-solving in class.

Week 10: April 22 Collaborative Learning

From Grave Marker to Memorial Card: Photography and the Culture of Remembrance. 4:00-5:15pm
Gena Philibert-Ortega

Photography, since the mid-to late 19th century, has played an important role in preserving the memory of the deceased, extending well beyond the well-known practice of post-mortem photography. This presentation explores the many ways photographs have been incorporated into mourning and memorialization, including porcelain portraits on grave markers, funeral and memorial cards, prayer cards, memorial books, obituary photographs, and other commemorative objects. We will examine the history and evolution of these visual traditions, the technologies used to create them, and the cultural values they reflect. In some cases, these memorial items can provide valuable genealogical evidence, offering clues about religious affiliation, military service, organization membership, and the ways descendants chose to remember those who came before them.

Student Presentations. 5:45-7:00pm
Students will be encouraged to either provide a review of an Association of Gravestone Studies Marker’s article or research based on what they have learned in this course. Student Presentations are voluntary.

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