Obits Highlight Presidential Picks
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2 min readA recent trend in the obituary pages has prompted us to create our very own, extremely unscientific, presidential poll.
A recent trend in the obituary pages has prompted us to create our very own, extremely unscientific, presidential poll. Many obituaries published during the 2012 presidential election campaign have included stories about their loved ones’ support for their favorite candidate and/or requests for donations to the candidates’ campaigns. Some offer a quiet mention of the candidate the deceased supported, while others shout an impassioned plea for sanity as the deceased saw it.
As the trend becomes more popular, the obituary section is beginning to look a bit like "Letters to the Editor"… and according to our (really very, very unscientific) research, it looks like President Obama has a slight edge over Romney. But of course, it's too early to call… and we expect to be able to build on our poll with a lot more obituaries like these in the coming months.
Barbara Woods Penhallegon, who died June 30, 2012 at age 87, was very active with Republican Women from an early age and continued to be very politically minded until the end according to her obit in the Daily Sentinel of Grand Junction, Colorado. With a "Romney Believe in America" bumper sticker proudly displayed on her hospital bed, "her goal was to live long enough to vote."
Barbara "Bobbie" Frances Lytle Benes was "one of a kind" according to her obituary in the Boston Globe. "Vibrant, sassy, and independent, funny, smart and stylish," the 82-year-old, who died June 21, 2012, "lived life fully and on her own terms." Her family asked that memorial donations be made to Partners In Health or "of course", to the Obama campaign.This post was contributed by Alana Baranick, a freelance obituary writer. She was the director of the Society of Professional Obituary Writers and chief author of Life on the Death Beat: A Handbook for Obituary Writers before she passed away in 2015.
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