National Obituary Archive(NOA)

6/29/2001

From Past and Present
Everton's Genealogical Helper
May-June 2001

Arrangeonline.com, in alliance with America Online, Inc., provides AOL members and Web visitors with genealogical and historical information. Arrangeonline.com publishes obituaries of ordinary people, as well as a “Celebrity Obituaries” section that reports the deaths of people in the news.

The site can be reached through AOL’s News Channel (AOL Keyword: Arrangeonline) and on the Web at www.Arrangeonline.com. Arrangeonline. com launched its website in October 2000 with the exclusive endorsement of the National Funeral Directors Association, the leading membership organization in the funeral industry. The startup immediately embarked on building the largest obituary database in the world and now has nearly 50 million death records online in its National Obituary Archive (NOA).

After some genealogists noted that some NOA records contain inaccurate information from the Social Security Administration, Arrangeonline.com recently added a feature to enable authoritative sources to provide free updates and corrections to ensure the accuracy of information in the archive. The site is updated throughout the day with new obituaries from funeral homes around the country. Nearly 1,000 funeral homes have signed up to submit obituaries to the online archive.

“We look at this agreement as a benefit to millions of people seeking information about their loved ones and people of interest to them,” said Michael Fullington, President of Arrangeonline. com. “Now it’s easier for families to publish historical family information and obituary information where it is readily accessible to those who want to know and be able to respond.”

“Through this alliance, Arrangeonline. com will enable AOL members to easily and conveniently search for a variety of history, genealogy, and obituary information. We’re also making important funeral information more easily available to millions of people across the country,” said Paul DeBenedictis, President of AOL’s Digital City.

The obituary pages have long been among the most widely read features of local newspapers, but in an increasingly mobile society, millions of people are seeking such information beyond their local areas. By building a central database called the National Obituary Archive, Arrangeonline.com makes millions of obituaries freely available to genealogists and family-tree researchers, as well as those seeking information about the most recent deaths in their community.

The archive enables visitors to search not just by name or date, but also by hometown, place of birth, place of death, organization membership and numerous identifying criteria.

The co-branded websites also offer an “Obituary Alert” feature that enables people to register to be notified by e-mail whenever an obituary fitting their selected criteria is published on Arrangeonline.com. People can send flowers and condolences to family and friends or create their own memorial tributes. Other information on the sites includes maps and directions to funeral homes, services and cemeteries, a directory of the nation's 22,000 funeral homes, and guidance for planning a funeral.

Arrangeonline.com is a subsidiary of Jonesboro, Arkansas-based Continental Computer Corporation, maker of the leading software for managing funerals and funeral homes. Fullington said 43% of the 2.4 million deaths in the U.S. this year will be handled by funeral homes using Continental’s premier software product, The Director’s Assistant for Windows. The tie to Continental gives the Internet startup access to between 5 million and 10 million obituaries already stored electronically by users of The Director’s Assistant for Windows.

For more information, contact: Michael Putzel, Arrangeonline.com, (202) 835-0203, e-mail mputzel@ Arrangeonline.com, or Nadine Smith, CEO, Arrangeonline.com, Inc. (713) 863-9728, e-mail nadines@Arrangeonline.com.