BDM announcements

[mxyzptlk]

I assume the Times has carried a BDM section (mostly for the well to do) but when did it become more popular for the lower echelons to start announcing the BDM's in the local papers.

[dotty.]

From the 1960s I think,

[mxyzptlk]

Thanks Dotty, I was thinking along them lines too. So guess not much point in checking the local reg archives for missing relatives in the early part of the 20th century

[Barmaid]

Mxyxptlk - DO check! I've got a collection of newspaper reports and clippings starting about 1886 which deal with BMDs. Admittedly there are not many births but I've got loads of obits and a couple of marriages.

[dotty.]

I know the local newspapers charged quite a sum for insertion of an announcement, which means the lower echelons of society certainly couldn't afford the luxury in the 19th century, but I suppose it is more about who you deemed to be lower echelons and whether you mean the column inches of reporting of a funeral or death or a wedding rather than the more simple 3 or 4 page announcement put in the BMD section of a local paper in alphabetical order. There are many many instances of obits in local papers, my Mum had one in the Ormskirk advertiser, it was almost half a page, we didn't pay for it, it was put in as a local interest item I suppose, We paid for the acknowledgement for the charity donations in the relevent column a few weeks late. My marriage was reported in the same paper with a full length picture, but I was well known in the town and it was news, but my parents paid for the engagement announcement in the right column, That is how neaspapers worked, I do think that the First World War was really the starting point for more people of less well off backgrounds to use the local announcment section, as there was a great effort by local papers to include a photo and write up of casualties amongst local lads who had been lost in the War. Prior to that there was a greater social element to the columns and it had an exclusivity.

[dotty.]

*I meant 3 or 4 line announcement not page!

[mxyzptlk]

Thanks for the info, I won't totally discount them when I plan my visit to the northern archives.