I started cutting out obituaries from the Southwest Virginia Enterprise 
for Authur D. Umberger of Aldan PA for his Umberger/Umbarger book/work and 
when he passed away, I just put the ones which I had not send away. 
Later I started collecting my data into a computer genealogy database and 
planned to include information from the obituaries.  Well by 1995 I had  
the time to type in these obituaries from the earlier period and current 
obituaries to create these indexes.  For the early years I only had the 
obituaries and are missing some dates but they are better than nothing.   
  The way I use these indexes is I create a temp copy of my main database 
and add an year, run the match/merge option of my genealogy database  
program and for possible matches, I review the full obituaries.  This has 
help me fill in the current information for the families in my database 
continuing the work of my aunts.  Another way to use these indexes is to 
create a large database with all of the years and review how the various 
families and siblings die off over the years. 
  Yes I know that the Enterprise has been on the web since 21 Sept 1996 at 
http://www.wythenews.com/  but there is no easy way to search only the  
obituaries and no way to do my match/merge.  Now these indexes allow you  
to find a possible match and then review the full obituary online if after 
21 Sept 1996 to see if it is the person you want.  Older editions you will 
have to fall back to reviewing the full obituary on film. 
  Please read the Details and some history page to see the format and rules 
I use to create these indexes. 
              Sept 1999 
  Well the Enterprise has started to take on some of the bad habits of the 
online world.  The 01 Sept 1999 online edition of the Enterprise obituaries 
included 2 obituaries which are not in the printed edition until 04 Sept  
and in the 22 Sept edition full obituaries were not printed only short 
obituaries with a comment to check the Web for the full obituaries.  I am 
afraid that this is only the start to the degrading of the print edition.  
I will still base these indexes on the date and contents of the obituaries 
in the printed edition.