Obituary Scraper for Legacy.com — Names, Dates & Funeral Homes

Search and extract obituaries from Legacy.com at scale: full name, birth & death dates, age, funeral home, location, bio, photo and the source obituary URL. Search by name or keyword, or paste Legacy.com search URLs, and get clean JSON/CSV/Excel in seconds. Built for genealogy, records research, memorial and journalism use.

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What This Actor Does

Legacy.com is the largest obituary network, aggregating notices from thousands of newspapers and funeral homes. This Actor turns a name search into a structured dataset. For each obituary it returns:

• Person — full name, first/last name, age, birth date and death date
• Obituary — bio/summary, portrait photo, date posted, source obituary URL
• Source — funeral home / publisher and Legacy affiliate
• Location — primary location and all associated places

Search by first/last name or keyword — the Actor paginates (50 per page) and returns one clean row per person.

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Why Use This

• Structured obituary data. Names, exact birth/death dates, ages, funeral homes and locations as clean fields — ready for genealogy trees, records databases and analysis.
• Nationwide coverage. Legacy.com aggregates thousands of newspapers and funeral homes, so a single name search spans the whole country.
• Funeral home & source links. Each record links to the original obituary and names the funeral home — useful for verification and outreach.
• Fast and clean. Reads Legacy's own structured page data (not brittle HTML), paginating automatically.

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Quick Start

Run it in the console (no code)

1. Enter a Last name (and optionally a First name or Keyword).
2. Set Max obituaries, then click Start.
3. Export as JSON, CSV, Excel or HTML, or push to Google Sheets, a webhook or a database.

The proxy is preconfigured (US residential) since Legacy.com requires it — just enter a name and run.

Run it via API (Python)

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN")

run_input = {
    "lastName": "Smith",
    "maxItems": 200,
}

run = client.actor("YOUR_USERNAME/legacy-obituary-scraper").call(run_input=run_input)

for o in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(o["fullName"], "·", o["birthDate"], "–", o["deathDate"], "·", o["funeralHome"])

Build a genealogy dataset (Python)

run = client.actor("YOUR_USERNAME/legacy-obituary-scraper").call(run_input={
    "lastName": "OConnell",
    "maxItems": 500,
})
rows = [o for o in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items()
        if o.get("birthDate") and o.get("deathDate")]
print(len(rows), "records with full dates")

Use a Legacy.com search URL (Node.js)

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';
const client = new ApifyClient({ token: 'YOUR_APIFY_TOKEN' });

const run = await client.actor('YOUR_USERNAME/legacy-obituary-scraper').call({
    startUrls: ['https://www.legacy.com/obituaries/search?lastName=Smith&keyword=Chicago'],
    maxItems: 300,
});
const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items.length, 'obituaries');

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Input Parameters

Field	Type	Description
firstName	string	First name to search (optional).
lastName	string	Last name / surname to search.
keyword	string	Free-text keyword (city, funeral home, term).
startUrls	array	Legacy.com search/browse URLs (use instead of name fields for full control).
maxItems	integer	Max obituaries across all searches. 0 = no limit.
maxPages	integer	Max result pages per search (50 per page). Default 40.
proxyConfiguration	object	Preconfigured to US residential (required by Legacy.com).

Provide a name/keyword or startUrls (or both).

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Output

Each obituary is one record:

{
  "obituaryId": "61758939",
  "fullName": "Jeffery Smith",
  "firstName": "Jeffery",
  "lastName": "Smith",
  "age": 69,
  "birthDate": "1957-06-12",
  "deathDate": "2026-06-27",
  "bio": "Smith passed away on Saturday, June 27, 2026...",
  "photo": "https://...",
  "funeralHome": "Crossville Memorial Funeral Home & Crematory, Inc.",
  "obituaryUrl": "https://crossvillememorial.com/obituaries/jeffery-smith-2026",
  "publisher": "legacyadn",
  "datePosted": "2026-06-29",
  "primaryLocation": "Crossville, United States",
  "locations": ["Crossville, United States", "St. Louis, United States"],
  "legacyUrl": "https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/name/jeffery-smith-obituary?id=61758939"
}

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Use Cases

1. Genealogy & family history

Collect names, exact birth/death dates, ages and locations to build family trees and fill gaps in genealogical records.

2. Records & vital-data research

Aggregate obituaries by surname or region for demographic, historical or academic research.

3. Journalism & memorials

Find and compile obituaries for reporting, memorial pages, or notable-person tracking.

4. Funeral-industry insight

See which funeral homes publish which notices and where — useful for market and coverage analysis.

5. Data enrichment

Match and enrich existing person records with obituary dates, locations and source links.

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Tips

• Broaden or narrow: search by lastName alone for wide coverage, add firstName or keyword (e.g. a city) to focus.
• startUrls lets you paste any Legacy.com search — filters in the URL are respected.
• maxItems: 0 paginates to the end of the result set (50 per page).
• Schedule it with Apify Schedules to capture new obituaries over time.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Do I need a Legacy.com account? No. The Actor reads publicly visible obituary listings — no login required.

Why is a proxy required? Legacy.com is protected by Cloudflare; a US residential proxy is preconfigured so it works out of the box.

How current is the data? It reflects what Legacy.com shows for your search at run time — recent and historical notices, newest first.

What export formats are supported? JSON, CSV, Excel, HTML, or via API — plus Google Sheets, webhooks, Make and Zapier.

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Legal & Responsible Use

This Actor is an independent tool and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Legacy.com or any newspaper or funeral home. All trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

It collects only publicly available obituary information. Obituary data concerns deceased persons and their families — please use it respectfully and lawfully:

• Comply with applicable data-protection laws and Legacy.com's Terms of Service.
• Do not use the data for spam, harassment of grieving families, or any unlawful purpose.
• Use reasonable request volumes and scheduling.