Death is the only thing we can't escape, yet finding the paperwork for it is surprisingly annoying. If you grew up in Delco, you know the routine. You’re looking for a neighbor, an old teacher from Monsignor Bonner, or maybe a distant cousin who lived in Upper Darby. You head straight for the daily times obituaries delaware county section because that's just what people do here. But honestly? The way we find these records has changed so much that even locals get tripped up by the digital paywalls and the weird syndication deals between newspapers and legacy websites.
It’s frustrating. You just want to know when the viewing at Donohue Funeral Home is.
The Delaware County Daily Times—or just "The Daily Times" if you're actually from Media or Chester—has been the record of note for over a century. It's the paper that captured the lives of the shipbuilders, the refinery workers, and the families tucked into the row homes of Clifton Heights. But searching for a specific name isn't as simple as flipping to the back of a damp newsprint bundle on your porch anymore.
The Reality of Searching Daily Times Obituaries Delaware County Today
Let's get one thing straight: the physical paper is a ghost of its former self. Most people accessing these records are doing it through the Daily Times website or a third-party aggregator like Legacy.com.
There is a weird quirk with how these things are indexed. Sometimes, a name won't show up in the "Recent" tab because of a delay in the funeral home's data feed. If you’re hunting for a notice from three days ago and it’s not popping up, don't panic. It doesn’t mean they didn’t publish it. It often means the digital handshake between the newspaper’s CMS (Content Management System) and the national obituary databases is lagging. This happens more often than the publishers like to admit.
Why the "Daily Times" Name Matters
Delaware County is a specific place. It’s not Philly, and it’s certainly not "Greater Philadelphia" to the people who live there. When you search for daily times obituaries delaware county, you are looking for a hyper-local connection. This paper covers the 49 municipalities that make up the county. From the upscale quiet of Radnor to the grit of Chester, the obituaries here reflect a very specific blue-collar-to-white-collar transition that defines the region.
If you try to find a Delco obit in the Philadelphia Inquirer, you might find it, but it’ll be truncated. The Daily Times is where you get the "Real Delco" details—the mentions of the local VFW posts, the parish names, and the specific Little League teams they coached for thirty years.
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Navigating the Paywalls and the Archives
Let’s be real. It’s annoying to hit a paywall when you’re just trying to find out where to send flowers.
The Delaware County Daily Times is owned by MediaNews Group (MNG). They are notorious for aggressive paywalls. You get a few articles for free, and then—bam—you’re locked out.
- The Incognito Trick: Honestly, sometimes just opening your browser in Incognito or Private mode works to bypass the immediate cookie-based tracker. It’s a bit hit-or-miss these days as paywall tech gets smarter, but it’s worth a shot.
- Library Access: If you are a resident, the Delaware County Library System is your best friend. They have databases that allow you to search historical archives of the Daily Times without paying a dime. You just need a library card.
- The Funeral Home Loophole: This is the big one. Most people forget that funeral homes are essentially their own publishers now. If you know the person died in Delco, skip the newspaper search entirely and go to the websites of the big local players: Kovacs, Rigby, or D'Anjolell. They post the full text of the obituary for free, usually before it even hits the paper.
Historical Research vs. Recent Notices
If you are doing genealogy, the daily times obituaries delaware county archives are a gold mine, but they are messy. For anything pre-2000, you aren't looking at a sleek website. You are looking at microfilm or digitized scans that haven't been OCR'd (Optical Character Recognition) perfectly.
Think about the 1918 flu or the industrial accidents at the Sun Shipyard. Those stories are buried in the obits. To find them, you usually need more than just a name. You need a date of death within a three-day window. Back then, the Daily Times (or its predecessors) would run "Death Notices" which were just tiny snippets, and "Obituaries" which were the longer narrative pieces.
Many people confuse the two. A death notice is a legal record; an obituary is a tribute. If you're looking for a 1950s ancestor, you might only find a three-line notice mentioning the cemetery. That was standard for working-class families who couldn't afford a long-form write-up.
The Shift to Legacy.com
Around the mid-2000s, everything changed. The Daily Times partnered with Legacy, like most local papers did. This was a double-edged sword. On one hand, it made things searchable by Google. On the other hand, it turned the comment section of an obituary into a "Guest Book."
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Have you ever looked at those? They are fascinating. In Delaware County, these guest books often become impromptu reunions for people who haven’t seen each other since they graduated from Ridley High in '78. But be careful—those guest books aren't permanent. Sometimes they are archived or hidden behind a "sponsor" fee after a year. If you want to keep those messages, copy-paste them into a Word doc immediately. Don't trust the cloud to keep your family memories forever.
What People Get Wrong About Delco Records
People often assume that every death in the county is recorded in the Daily Times. That’s just not true anymore.
Cost is a massive factor. A full obituary with a photo in a printed daily paper can cost hundreds, sometimes over a thousand dollars depending on the word count. Because of this, many families are opting for "digital only" memorials or just posting on social media.
If you can't find a record for daily times obituaries delaware county, check the Main Line Times or even the Spirit of Chester. Depending on where in the county the person lived, the family might have chosen a different outlet to save money or reach a more specific neighborhood.
Also, check Facebook. Seriously. There are "Delco History" and "Remembering [Town Name]" groups that act as unofficial obituary boards. They often have more info than the paper does.
How to Effectively Search the Digital Archives
If you are using the official Daily Times site, keep your search terms broad.
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- Don't use middle names initially.
- Do use variations of the last name (especially for common Delco names like Murphy, Smith, or DiFabio).
- Search by years. The search engines on newspaper sites are often clunky. If you search "John Boyle 2024," it might fail, but "John Boyle" with a date filter usually works.
If you’re looking for someone who passed away in the last 24 hours, the paper’s website is usually updated by 10:00 AM EST. If it's not there by then, it likely won't appear until the following day. Funeral homes have deadlines—usually around 2:00 PM or 4:00 PM the day before publication. If the family missed that window, the obit stays in limbo for another 24-hour cycle.
Actionable Steps for Locating a Record
Searching for a record shouldn't be a second tragedy. If you're stuck, follow this workflow to find what you need without losing your mind or your money.
Check the Big Aggregators First
Start with Legacy.com and search "Delaware County Daily Times." It’s often faster than the actual newspaper website because it’s optimized for search traffic. If the name is common, add the specific town like "Media" or "Brookhaven" in the keyword field.
Use Social Media for Context
Go to Facebook and search the person's name plus the word "funeral" or "passing." In tight-knit communities like Delco, someone has almost certainly shared the link to the funeral home's page. This bypasses the newspaper's paywall entirely.
Contact the Delaware County Historical Society
If you are looking for an old record (pre-1990) and the library's digital portal is failing you, the Historical Society in Paschall Mill is a lifesaver. They have physical clippings and a deeper knowledge of the paper's various name changes over the decades.
The "In Lieu of Flowers" Clue
When you do find the obituary, look at the "In Lieu of Flowers" section. In Delaware County, these often point toward very specific local charities—like the Providence Animal Center or local parish funds. This is a great way to verify you’ve found the right person if you’re dealing with a common name.
Print It or Save as PDF
Newspaper websites are notoriously unstable. Links break. Companies get bought out. If you find an obituary that matters to your family history, don't just bookmark it. Use the "Print to PDF" function on your browser and save a hard copy to a cloud drive like Google Drive or Dropbox. You’ll thank yourself in ten years when the Daily Times website has inevitably undergone another "rebrand" that wipes out old links.