County looks to digitize marriage records dating back to 1800s

Thousands of Cape Girardeau County marriage records, some dating back to the early 1800s, will be digitized and stored electronically as part of the county's efforts to preserve historic documents.

The Cape Girardeau County Commission Thursday approved a request from county Recorder of Deeds Drew Blattner to seek bids for the digitization project that is expected to cost approximately $31,000. Half of the cost will be paid through a records preservation grant provided by the Missouri Secretary of State's office.

"This is something that needs to be done in every county," Blattner said. "If some sort of a disaster happened -- fire, tornado, earthquake, water damage -- if the records haven't been digitized then they're lost forever. My biggest goal is to get everything in the office, all record types, digitized and then to have those digital images backed up on microfilm at off-site storage locations just in case."

Once the records are electronically stored, they'll be searchable online through the recorder of deed's online database.

In addition to being searchable, Blattner said it will eventually be possible to order documents online as well, $2 for a plain copy and $9 for a certified document that would be mailed out by the recorder's office.

Drew Blattner, Cape Girardeau County's recorder of deeds, examines some of the county's fading marriage records dating back to the early 1800s on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2019, at the Cape Girardeau County Recorder of Deeds Office in Jackson.Jay Wolz ~ jwolz@semissourian.com

Blattner said once a vendor is chosen for the project, electronic document conversion could begin later this year and should be complete by the end of April.

Marriage records stored in the recorder's office predate both Cape Girardeau County, founded in 1812, and Missouri, which gained statehood in 1821. Although they have been laminated, many of the oldest documents are yellowing and the meticulous, handwritten records are starting to fade.

"I am very worried that the pages will become illegible over time as the glues in the lamination break down," Blattner said. "As recorder of deeds, it is my duty to preserve all recorded documents for future generations and to make them readily accessible to the public."

The document preservation project will create electronic files of 11 marriage index books dating back to Nov. 28, 1806, and running through Dec. 30, 1991. "These indexes are very important because they are the only way to find a marriage record unless a searcher knows when the marriage occurred," Blattner explained. In addition, 37 volumes of actual marriage documents will be digitized.

Marriage indexes and marriage records are among the "most searched" documents in the recorder's office and because they've been handled so much over the years, Blattner said they've been subject to a substantial amount of wear and tear.

"The biggest threat to these books is the use by searchers flopping them on the table and quickly flipping through the pages to find the information they need," he said. "Pages have been torn, wrinkled and stained by oils on the hands of the searchers. If something happens to them, we would lose a large segment of our vital records."

Asked how many marriage records will be part of the preservation project, Blattner said it's hard to estimate. "In the last few years we issue anywhere from 500 to 600 marriage licenses per year, but back in the early 1800s there weren't nearly that many, maybe a few dozen a year," he said, adding that there was a big spike in the early 1940s when servicemen were married just before World War II.

"The state didn't mandate marriage licenses until 1881, so before that, when you got married you simply went to the recorder's office and had it recorded," Blattner said, adding that before 1806, marriages in the "Cape Girardeau District" were merely noted among property deed records.

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