Obituary Examples You Can Copy and Adapt

These are written to be used. Names and details are invented; the structure and phrasing are the parts worth keeping. Replace everything in the examples and read the result aloud — if a sentence sounds like a form letter, it is one, and it should go.

If you want the reasoning behind the structure rather than a model to copy, the step-by-step guide covers it paragraph by paragraph.

Short notices

Fifty to a hundred words. This is what a newspaper death notice usually is, and what you want if the paper is charging by the line.

Mother

Margaret Ann Whitfield, 84, of Asheville, died on August 2, 2026. She is survived by her husband James, her son Michael, and four grandchildren. A service will be held at Grace Memorial Chapel on Saturday, August 15, at 11:00 a.m. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be made to the Asheville Public Library.

Father

Harold J. Bennett, 79, of Toledo, died at home on March 4, 2026, after a long illness. He is survived by his wife of fifty-one years, Ruth; his daughters Karen and Anne; and six grandchildren. Visitation will be held Thursday from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. at Kellerman Funeral Home, with a funeral Mass Friday at 10:00 a.m. at St. Brigid's.

Husband

David Alan Reyes, 61, of Sacramento, died unexpectedly on June 12, 2026. He is survived by his wife Elena, his son Marcus, and his sister Teresa. A celebration of his life will be held at the Riverside Community Hall on Saturday, June 22, at 2:00 p.m. All who knew him are welcome.

Wife

Sandra Lee Okafor, 58, of Durham, died on January 9, 2026, following a brief illness. She is survived by her husband Daniel, her daughters Grace and Chidi, and her mother Patricia. A memorial service will be held Saturday, January 18, at 1:00 p.m. at Trinity Chapel, with a reception to follow in the fellowship hall.

Son

Ethan Michael Carver, 27, of Boise, died on May 3, 2026. He is survived by his parents, Thomas and Rachel Carver, and his brother Nathan. A gathering to remember him will be held at Ridgeline Park on Sunday, May 17, at 4:00 p.m. The family asks that anyone who has a photograph of Ethan bring a copy to share.

Daughter

Sophia Rose Lindqvist, 34, of Portland, died on October 7, 2026. She is survived by her parents, Erik and Maria Lindqvist; her partner, Jordan Hale; and her sister Annika. A memorial will be held at the Fremont Arts Center on Saturday, October 19, at 3:00 p.m., with an open invitation to speak.

Grandmother

Rosalind "Rosie" Kowalczyk, 91, of Green Bay, died peacefully on February 14, 2026, surrounded by her family. She was preceded in death by her husband Stanley. She is survived by three children, eleven grandchildren and nineteen great-grandchildren. A funeral Mass will be held Monday at 10:00 a.m. at St. Willebrord.

Grandfather

Walter "Sonny" Boyd, 88, of Mobile, died on July 22, 2026. A veteran of the United States Navy, he is survived by his wife Doris, two sons, seven grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. Graveside services with military honors will be held Wednesday at 9:00 a.m. at Pine Crest Cemetery.

Standard length

Two hundred to four hundred words. This is the newspaper obituary and the one that goes in the program. It has room for who they actually were.

Mother

Margaret Ann Whitfield died at home in Asheville on August 2, 2026, at the age of 84, with her husband and her son in the room.

Born in Knoxville in 1941 to Walter and Edith Combs, she moved to North Carolina at twenty-three and never seriously considered leaving. She taught third grade at Oakmont Elementary for fifty-one years and could still, at eighty, name the children in a class photograph from 1974.

She kept a kitchen that smelled permanently of garlic and butter, and she did not let anyone leave without a container of something. She was a stubborn gardener who refused to stake her tomatoes and lost half of them most years to a wind she claimed never came.

She is survived by her husband of sixty-one years, James; her son, Michael, and his wife Dana; her sister, Anna Combs Reid; and four grandchildren, who called her Nonnie for reasons nobody can now reconstruct. She was preceded in death by her son David.

A service will be held at Grace Memorial Chapel, 412 Elm Street, Asheville, on Saturday, August 15, at 11:00 a.m., with a reception following in the parish hall. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that donations be made to the Asheville Public Library, where she volunteered every Tuesday for nineteen years.

Father

Harold J. Bennett of Toledo died at home on March 4, 2026, at the age of 79, after a long illness borne with the same lack of complaint he applied to everything else.

He was born in Sandusky in 1946, served four years in the Air Force, and then spent thirty-eight years as a machinist at Toledo Forge, where he was the man other men were sent to when a part would not come right.

He was a poor fisherman and an enthusiastic one. He kept a 1978 pickup running well past the point of sense, and when he finally sold it he did not mention it to anyone for two weeks.

He is survived by his wife of fifty-one years, Ruth; his daughters, Karen Bennett Ellis and Anne Bennett; and six grandchildren. He was preceded in death by his brother Raymond.

Visitation will be held Thursday from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. at Kellerman Funeral Home, 22 North Ridge Road. A funeral Mass will be celebrated Friday at 10:00 a.m. at St. Brigid's Catholic Church, followed by burial at Calvary Cemetery.

Grandmother

Rosalind Kowalczyk — Rosie to everyone, including several people who were briefly her doctors — died in Green Bay on February 14, 2026, at 91.

She was born in a farmhouse outside Pulaski in 1934, one of nine. She married Stanley Kowalczyk in 1955 and they ran a corner grocery on Broadway for thirty-one years, where she extended credit to families she knew could not pay it back and kept the ledger anyway, out of politeness.

She made pierogi every Christmas Eve for a number of people that grew each year and was never once counted in advance. She played euchre with a ferocity that alarmed strangers.

She was preceded in death by her husband Stanley and by her son Thomas. She is survived by her children Barbara, Janet and Michael; eleven grandchildren; and nineteen great-grandchildren.

A funeral Mass will be held Monday at 10:00 a.m. at St. Willebrord Church, with burial to follow at Allouez Catholic Cemetery.

Long-form

Five hundred words or more. There is no reason to write this for a newspaper — it will cost a great deal by the line. Write it for the memorial page, the booklet, and the family.

A life with a long working chapter

Eleanor Ruth Vance died on the morning of April 18, 2026, at her home in Charleston, aged 87, having spent the previous evening arguing with her granddaughter about a crossword clue she turned out to be right about.

She was born in 1939 in Beaufort, the second of four children of Samuel and Clara Vance. Her father ran a hardware store; her mother taught piano to most of the town. Eleanor learned both trades and used neither.

She took a nursing qualification in 1960 because it was one of the three things a woman could then be paid properly to do, and discovered to her own surprise that she was extraordinary at it. She spent twenty-six years in the emergency department at Roper Hospital and eleven more running its nursing staff. She was known for a particular quality that is hard to name: frightened people became calm around her, and she never appeared to be doing anything to cause it.

She married Clifford Hale in 1963. They were married fifty-four years, and she described the arrangement as "mostly successful", which was the highest praise she gave anything.

She read three newspapers a day and disagreed with all of them. She grew camellias with more success than she admitted. She had an unshakeable and entirely unexplained loyalty to a baseball team that rarely rewarded it.

In retirement she volunteered at the free clinic on Meeting Street every Wednesday for nineteen years, and stopped only when her family conspired to hide her car keys.

She was preceded in death by her husband, Clifford, and by her brother Samuel Jr. She is survived by her daughters, Ruth Hale Owens and Margaret Hale; her son, Thomas Hale, and his wife Priya; seven grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren.

A service will be held at St. Michael's Church, 71 Broad Street, on Saturday, May 2, at 11:00 a.m. The family will receive friends afterwards at the parish house. Donations in her memory may be made to the Meeting Street Free Clinic.