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Archiver > PACAMBRI > 2000-04 > 0954965891


From: "phylwint" <>
Subject: [PACAMBRI] Social Security Records
Date: Wed, 5 Apr 2000 13:18:11 -0700


The reason many people don't show up on the Social Security Death Index is because their deaths happened before the mid-1960s. There are a few on the index for the 1960s but most are from 1970 and later. I believe I read somewhere Social Security has no plans at this time of going back and picking these earlier deaths up. As for the statement that when a survivor drew a monthly check, the husband or wife of the original pension wouldn't show up - that isn't quite right. It may have been the rule for early deaths under Social Security but that changed by the 1990s. My father was the only one of my parents who worked for a wage. He drew a social security pension, died in 1989; mother drew a death benefit (burial - $250), and went on to draw his monthly social security pension until she died 18 months ago. There must be another reason for the party not showing up on the records. There is always the chance of an error on the index. Sometimes it is a matter of always knowing Grandmother as Betty when her name was really Elizabeth Jane, the name on her birth certificate. Other times there was another marriage after the first husband died, but the wife continued to draw under the surname of the first marriage even after she married a second time.

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