Finding Pennsylvania's Delayed Birth Certificates at FamilySearch

I recently discovered FamilySearch's collection of Pennsylvania Delayed Birth Records, 1941-1976.  What a great resource for deceased family members who were born before 1906, when Pennsylvania's Department of Health began issuing birth certificates, and who lived long enough to enroll in Social Security, which required birth records. 

I understand that states created delayed birth certificates to give those individuals a way to obtain birth records.  Of course, one couldn't just sign a form stating his or her date of birth.  The state required information from others to attest to the date of birth which means there's some great genealogy information in these records. 

This is some of the information requested for these certificates:

• Name of applicant including name at birth and possibly married name, if female
• Applicant's address
  
• Applicant's date and location of birth
• Father's name, place of birth, age when applicant was born, occupation, and current address
• Mother's name (which may include maiden name), age when applicant was born, place of birth, occupation, and current address
• Relative's information including name, relationship to applicant, and current address
• Information of non-relative, possibly a neighbor or in-law, including how the individual knows the applicant and for how long
• Date filed
• Date issued
  

These records are from the county Orphan's Courts and the collection includes records from 35 of Pennsylvania's 67 counties.  The counties where my ancestors lived, Mercer and Butler, have limited civil records during the years some of my ancestors and collaterals were born which makes this record set a great boon to my research for Mercer County relatives born in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

A quick search of these records using only the last name of "Doyle" and location "Mercer County, Pennsylvania" gave me links to certificates for
   > Emma Doyle Leathers, my grandfather's older sister
   > Hazel Doyle McAlister, my grandfather's younger sister
   > William N. McClelland, my father's cousin's husband, also son-in-law of Emma Doyle
Add more information for more accurate results.

I would love to post images of the certificates I found but there are contract restrictions between Pennsylvania and FamilySearch which prevent downloading and printing these records.  I was able to make screen shots and splice the three images (for each certificate) together but I don't want to violate the contract restrictions by posting them.

Learn more about these records at Pennsylvania Delayed Birth Certificates at FamilySearch. 

–Nancy.

Copyright ©2021, Nancy Messier.  All Rights Reserved. 
Do not copy or use any content from this blog without written permission from the owner. 
.