Google News Archive Search pays off

I'm starting to really like the Google News Archive Search web site. I used it last night, and I used it again tonight.

Tonight, I plugged in the name of my Project M client's father as ["gxxxxxn * mxxxxxk"] - note that "x" is a letter (I'm trying to keep my research confidential, but had to brag about this) - and hit Search. I got 21 matches, and one of them was an obituary for my client's step-sister from 1997 in the town where my client grew up. The obituary listed the names of her two sisters and one brother, her two daughters and one son, and her husband. Now I have something concrete to go on. Some names to go search for addresses and telephone numbers.

I'm not sure that my client is up to contacting them, healthwise, but it is a great opportunity for him to learn more about his father, whom he last saw in 1943 and he has wondered all his life what happened to him.

Isn't it great when another great research tool comes along? The same search in the basic Google search turned up 302 matches, none of them this one obituary. In Google News Search, there were no matches. It was the News Archive Search of the newspaper files that resulted in the match.