When a longtime resident of Delta or Fillmore passes away, the news doesn’t just travel through the grapevine at the local grocery store. It ends up in the Millard County Chronicle Progress. For over a century, this paper has been the heartbeat of the county. Honestly, if you grew up around here, you know that the "Chronicle" (as most folks call it) is more than just paper and ink. It’s a record of who we are.
Finding millard county chronicle obituaries can be a bit of a trip through time. You’ve got the modern digital era where everything is a click away, but then there’s the deep history of two separate newspapers that eventually shook hands and became one.
The Weird History of the Chronicle Progress
Back in the day, you didn’t just have one paper. You had the Millard County Progress, which started way back in 1894 over in Fillmore. Then, in 1910, the Millard County Chronicle popped up in Delta. They were rivals, sorta, serving different ends of the county for decades.
It wasn't until around 1979 or 1980 that they finally merged. That matters for your search. If you’re looking for a relative who passed away in the 1920s, you need to know which side of the county they lived on. A Delta resident would be in the Chronicle, while someone from the east side would likely show up in the Progress.
Today, the Millard County Chronicle Progress lives at 40 North 300 West in Delta. It’s been in the Beckwith family for five generations. That kind of longevity is rare. It means the people writing and printing these notices often knew the person they’re writing about.
Where to Look Right Now
If you need a recent obituary—say, from the last couple of years—your best bet is the official website. They keep a pretty active digital archive. You can see names like Alice Louise Bond Warner or Ronald B. Anderson listed right there on their dedicated obituary page.
But what if you're doing genealogy?
- The Utah Digital Newspapers project: This is a goldmine. They have digitized copies of the Chronicle from as far back as 1910.
- Ancestry and FamilySearch: These platforms have indexed many of the Millard County records. FamilySearch actually has a specific collection for Millard County obituaries covering 1970 to 1999.
- The Local Libraries: The Delta City Library and the President Millard Fillmore Library are your friends here. They often have the microfilm or physical copies that haven't made it to the internet yet.
How to Actually Get an Obituary Published
It’s a tough time when you’re dealing with a loss. Kinda overwhelming, really. If you’re tasked with getting a notice into the paper, the process is pretty straightforward, but there are a few things that might catch you off guard.
First, they usually want the text by a certain deadline. Since the paper is a weekly (published every Wednesday), you can't just send something in on Tuesday morning and expect it to be in the next day's edition. Most people work through a funeral home like Nickle Mortuary or Olpin Stevens, and those folks usually handle the submission for you.
If you're doing it yourself, the Millard County Chronicle Progress website has a "Submissions" page. You’ll need:
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- The full name and dates (birth/death).
- A high-quality photo (digital is better).
- The story of their life—don't just list survivors; tell us they loved their garden or that they never missed a high school basketball game.
Costs vary. It’s not just a flat fee. It usually depends on how long the text is and if you want a photo. Some people think it’s free because it’s "news," but obituaries are actually paid notices. It’s basically a final tribute you’re buying for your loved one.
Why These Records Are Different
In a big city newspaper, an obituary is a sterile, three-line blurb. In Millard County, it’s a narrative. You’ll read about sheep herding in Meadow, or surviving the 1949 snowdrifts that reached the power lines. These stories provide context that a death certificate just can't touch.
I’ve seen obituaries that mention specific local brands or "the old bridge" that doesn't exist anymore. This is why researchers love millard county chronicle obituaries. They are micro-histories of the Great Basin.
Fact-Checking and Accuracy
One thing to keep in mind: older obituaries sometimes have typos. Names get misspelled. Dates might be off by a day because someone was remembering from memory in a moment of grief. If you find a conflict between a newspaper notice and a headstone at the Fillmore City Cemetery, the headstone or the official death certificate is usually the "official" word, but the obituary gives you the "human" word.
Actionable Steps for Your Search
If you are stuck looking for a specific person, don't just give up after one Google search.
- Check the archives by year, not just name. Sometimes OCR (optical character recognition) misses a name because the ink was smudged in 1942.
- Call the office. The staff at the Chronicle Progress (people like Shellie Dutson or Sam Jacobson) are local experts. If the digital search fails, they might know exactly which drawer the physical file is in.
- Visit the Utah State Archives. If the person died between 1905 and 1976, there’s a massive state-level index that can help you narrow down the exact date you should be looking for in the newspaper.
- Try "Find a Grave" first. Often, people will upload a scan of the original newspaper obituary directly to the person's memorial page. It can save you hours of microfilm scrolling.
Finding a piece of your family history in the millard county chronicle obituaries is about more than just data. It's about connecting to a specific place—a place of dust storms, wide-open deserts, and tight-knit communities that don't forget their own.