GENBOX-L Archives

Archiver > GENBOX > 2003-10 > 1066671790


From: "Paul J. Harris" <>
Subject: RE: [GENBOX] Stillborn Issue in Reports
Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2003 13:43:14 -0400
In-Reply-To: <CHEMKKAJHOKJPIEOPLKDKEBLELAA.clcasper@sprynet.com>


Cheri,

My first wife and I had a stillborn child in 1976. The State of Michigan
issues neither a birth certificate or a death certificate for the fetus.
Instead, they have a SEPARATE category: Certificate of Fetal Death, which
will not appear on either of the state's birth or death indexes. Ancestry
has Michigan Deaths 1971-1996, but nothing will make this entry appear, it
is not in the index of standard deaths. The State of Michigan has chosen to
view a fetal death as a unique event that involves neither a birth or death
EVENT. I was just wondering if Genbox should see it the same way? <g>

Paul

-----Original Message-----
From: Cheri Casper [mailto:]
Sent: Monday, October 20, 2003 11:59 AM
To:
Subject: RE: [GENBOX] Stillborn Issue in Reports


Paul -The IRS aside, I have several still birth situations but in all cases
these children had death certificates. Now there is no logical way you can
have a death certificate without first being born. <g> You can always just
tweak the sentence to read as you wish or suppress the Birth sentence or the
Death sentence and write a combined sentence in the Sentence field or the
Note field, whichever.

I don't fret too much over the minutia.

CheriC

-----Original Message-----
From: Paul J. Harris [mailto:]
Sent: Monday, October 20, 2003 5:40 AM
To:
Subject: RE: [GENBOX] Stillborn Issue in Reports


Cheri,

The only problem with that system is the child was never really born, with a
death event following. If you don't believe me, ask the IRS about taking an
exemption for the child during the tax year of the stillbirth! They won't
let you.

So, what are the implications of dealing with this situation in various
ways? You have illustrated one. But in a narrative it would generate, 'So
and so, born on ..., died of stillborn on ...."

I would also probably consider entering ONLY a Death event, subtype
Stillborn, but again, I think we run into a problem on the Descendancy
Narrative, which doesn't care about Subtypes on Birth and Death events. It
just says, "So and so, born on ..., died on ....

I'm afraid that the only way you could get that report to say 'stillborn on
...' is to have a specific Stillborn Event that is recognized by the report
generator as a Birth/Death event, and substitutes the appropriate language.

Perhaps I am missing something in the program design, or Bill has another
way of dealing with this? I can't find anything in the online help
addressing the issue.

Paul

-----Original Message-----
From: Cheri Casper [mailto:]
Sent: Sunday, October 19, 2003 8:38 PM
To:
Subject: RE: [GENBOX] Stillborn Issue in Reports


Paul - I use the standard birth event and create a death event wherein the
cause of death is "stillborn." I think Stillborn Event must have come over
from your previous program; I'm not seeing it as a default Event.

CheriC

-----Original Message-----
From: Paul J. Harris [mailto:]
Sent: Sunday, October 19, 2003 1:44 PM
To:
Subject: [GENBOX] Stillborn Issue in Reports


I have used a Stillborn Event. The Event Template may be from Genbox or my
import, I am not sure. At any rate, the template IS in the Birth Class.
Apparently, this is only for grouping, as the date does not initiate a
birth. Additionally, in a Descendancy Narrative report the Stillborn event
comes AFTER the Burial Event, even though the date is six days earlier.

My question is how are others handling Stillborn births? Seems like it would
be better to just create a Subtype for the Birth event to generate the
alternative sentence language. Is this how others are handling this?

Paul


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==============================
To join Ancestry.com and access our 1.2 billion online genealogy records, go
to:
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redir.asp?targetid=571&sourceid=1237



==== GENBOX Mailing List ====
To join this list, send an email to with the
word "subscribe" as the subject line. Then email your messages to
and they will appear on this list.

==============================
To join Ancestry.com and access our 1.2 billion online genealogy records, go
to:
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redir.asp?targetid=571&sourceid=1237


==== GENBOX Mailing List ====
To join this list, send an email to with the
word "subscribe" as the subject line. Then email your messages to
and they will appear on this list.

==============================
To join Ancestry.com and access our 1.2 billion online genealogy records, go
to:
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redir.asp?targetid=571&sourceid=1237



==== GENBOX Mailing List ====
To join this list, send an email to with the
word "subscribe" as the subject line. Then email your messages to
and they will appear on this list.

==============================
To join Ancestry.com and access our 1.2 billion online genealogy records, go
to:
http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redir.asp?targetid=571&sourceid=1237

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