The Social Security Death Index is a several million name database that comes from the Death Masters List of the Social Security Administration System. For a person to be listed on the Social Security Death Index the individual would had to have received benefits while alive. The second part of the criteria is that if the deceased did not file for benefits, his or her survivors had to have requested and received benefits. Third, the Social Security Administration had to have filed this information electronically so that it could be available for input into the appropriate file. Therefore, you may be able to find records on people you are searching for who have died as early as the late 1930’s. The output from this database includes the individuals name, social security number, birth date, death date, and zip code of place of death.

By knowing the death date and death place you can order the death certificate for the individual. With a copy of the death certificate and the social security number you can order what is referred to as a SS-5 form from the Social Security Administration. This is the original application that was filed to obtain the Social Security Number. This application is usually in the person’s own handwriting and contains information such as the parents names, place of birth, their date of birth, and whom they worked for at the time of the application.

If the person you are seeking is not listed on the Social Security Death Index and you know they are deceased they may have never claimed any benefits because they had a private retirement account or a federal retirement system or they died before they accessed the benefits and their spouse remarried quickly.

You can search the Social Security Death Index at www.rootsweb.com and click on the appropriate link. Once you locate the person you are seeking, there is information provided as to how to obtain the SS-5 form as well as provides you with a draft of a letter that you can use to request the SS-5 form.