Strange de Jim and the Thrill of the Obituary Hunt

Herb Caen is the namesake of the Magazines and Newspapers Center here on the 5th floor of the Main Library. But where would Herb Caen be without the quipster-tipster Strange de Jim? According to de Jim, "I Made Herb Caen & I Can Break Him." At least that was the title of his 1978 34 page pamphlet that amassed about 100 contributions he made to Caen's column up till that point. For Caen's part, he said of de Jim: 

“I hope we never meet. Ours is the perfect relationship,” Caen wrote [in the introduction to de Jim's book of Strangeisms]. “Strange favors me with his wit, and I favor him with my print. Come to think of it, he could even be a girl, for all I know. The whole thing is strange, isn’t it.”

Our unique San Francisco personality and legend Strange de Jim died on May 1, 2024. On May 17, Sam Whiting's obituary for him was published on the SF Chronicle website. Later, on May 19, the obituary ran in the print Sunday Chronicle, in the obituaries section. 

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Screen capture of the obituary that ran on the SF Chronicle website on May 17. Click to access.

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Screen capture of the obituary that ran in the SF Chronicle Sunday paper on May 19, 2024. Click to access (SFPL card required)

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Not to take the spotlight from de Jim, but this is an important lesson in the thrill of the obituary hunt. 

• Obituaries often appear in print much later than the date of the deceased's passing 
• Obituaries and other content will often be published first on the Chronicle's website, and subsequently appear in print (sometimes a week or more later)
  
• An obituary is usually submitted by friends or family and runs in the Life Tributes section of the Chronicle. Due to the fact that survivors are mourning, these obituaries can appear much, much later than the death of the individual, especially if they are not announcing a funeral
  
• However, obituaries for famous people, like Strange de Jim, are news pieces written by the newspapers journalists, and this is no exception 
• News piece obituaries appear in a variety of ways in print, but often appear in the Sunday edition of a paper--this is true for the SF Chronicle and the New York Times, to name a couple 

All this to say, obituaries can be tricky to locate if you are doing genealogy research but the librarians at the Magazines and Newspapers Center remain at your service. 

Feeling nostalgic or curious about Strange de Jim? Keep his memory alive by reading one of his books held at SFPL, or do a search in the SF Chronicle historic backfile to see all the mentions of Strange de Jim in Herb Caen's column.