Old, Original Victorian Certificates

Ephemera (paper items)…… Ephemera is pronounced “efem’mera”

Marriage & Birth Documents from the 1700's and 1800's are few in survival from these periods. The 1800's started greater attempts at keeping records and State statutes began requiring that a recorder keep a record of marriages, yet many did not comply. While vital records were at the hands of each State, some did not formalized even until the early 1900's. While not everyone could afford such precious documents, genealogy research will still lead you to parchment (or notebook) paper documents and small printed forms.

Public Notice

In order to get married during the 1700's and 1800's, most required permission by the parents (father). Couples could announce their intentions of marriage through the publication of banns; a marriage would be announced on three consecutive Sundays in church and if there were no objections, the couple was free to marry. Another way was through a marriage bond given to the court by the intended groom. Some made it public by mounting a notice in public view for fifteen days. The historical course of marriage is often described as a shift from marriage as a status to the notion of marriage as a contract, but both status and contract coexist in conceptions of marriage even today.

Recordkeeping System

The twentieth century took greater strides in the process. Church and family bible records are the earliest indication of a record-keeping system. Marriage and birth registrations can be found in bible records, baptismal records, school records, and old scrapbooks.

The U.S. Congress ordered an act in 1877 whereby documented information on marriages would be maintained in order to track their whereabouts (County and State of residence)---hence the marriage license.

Publishers and printers responded to the call of creating marriage and wedding documents. Some of the earliest marriage documents were printed in the 1850's (pre and post-civil war).

Other publishers began creating beautiful, paper documents using the process of chromolithography. Soon popped up those including Currier & Ives, Anderson & Cameron (1877), N. Currier, T. Newton Kurtz (the son of Rev. Benjamin Kurtz), CR Gibson, Abingdon Press, Eden Publishing House, Ernst Kaufmann, David W. Crider, M.C. Barthel, and W. Hageuberg, artist, for Cranston & Stowe Publishing Company.

The Northeast part of the country seemed to have the best record-keeping system with the most generated remains of these finely, printed originals. Perhaps you have the original belonging to your grandparents or great-grandparents!

Debate

Some make the argument (and debate) that once you apply for a marriage license from your County and State office you place yourself under the jurisdiction of the Family Court and its family laws. The debate continues that marriage was instituted by God, therefore it is a God-given right and is to be governed by the family. A Family Bible contains birth, baptism and death records---and a marriage certificate; some say that what is recorded in a Family Bible will stand up as legal evidence in any court of law in America. Both George Washington and Abraham Lincoln were married without a marriage license. They simply recorded their marriages in their Family Bibles. For this reason, some might have their present day marriage certificate read, “according to the Ordinance of God and the Laws of [the church] (versus the State/City/County).

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