Sample notice
Sample notice: a full obituary
Sample content. This is a demonstration of the notice template and it is not about a real person. No name, no dates and no service times on this page refer to anybody.
The longest of the three. A life written out, several hundred words, with the service details at the end and somewhere to leave a message.
A full obituary
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No name, no dates. This is the template with nothing in it, which is the only honest way to show it.
What would be here
- The name, in full, and what everybody actually called them
- Where and when they were born, and how they came to be here
- Work, and what they did with the rest of the time
- Who has died before them and who is left
- The service: where, when, and whether it is open to everybody
- Flowers, or a donation somewhere instead
- A condolence book that anybody can sign, which stays open afterwards
A family writes this, usually badly, usually at midnight, and usually it is the best thing anybody says all week. We will help, and we will not improve it into something nobody recognises.
The other two shapes
Same template, different lengths. A family often uses more than one.
- Sample notice: a short death notice — Forty words. The name, the date, the service, and nothing else — which is what a great many families want and what a newspaper charges by the line for.
- Sample notice: service times only — No biography at all. Times, places, and what to do about flowers. Used where a family wants the practical detail public and everything else private.
- Obituaries and notices — what a notice is for, and how to write one.
If a notice has to go in this week
The times can be set first and the wording can follow. The telephone is answered at every hour of every day.