I never bought the “birth announcements come from the Health Dept.” line. My family owned newspapers in those days and birth announcements came mainly from the family. The timeframe from the hospital to the health dept. to the newspaper just doesn’t work. There was a process that took time - first the hospital had to get it’s records together, then they would send over the births to the county courthouse, then the county clerk would have to register and file them, then the county would send the records over to the state health department, then the state health department would have to register and file them. Tell me, with manually filing everything and sending everything snail mail, how in the world could the health department could have notified the newspaper in time for the announcement to be published in the Aug. 13 edition?
Keep in mind that newspapers didn’t use computers but linotype machines. There was no cut and paste. Everything had to be typed in so information had to be in the reporters hands with plenty of lead time. The Aug. 13th edition had to be completed by the 12th to allow time for it to be printed. So, the earliest the hospital clerk could do her work would be Aug. 5th and the latest it could have gotten to the newspaper would be the 12th. That’s at the max 8 days. I’ve worked in a county clerk’s office and filed births and I can tell you that would entail some dedicated workers for the turn around to be complete in that time.
The Nordyke twins’ bc was stamped Aug. 11th and their number is before Hussein’s COLB. FYI, everything was stamped with the date it arrived in our office. That stamped date wasn’t the date it was finally filed. So again, it’s highly doubtful the announcement came from the health dept.
Notice the 5-5-1966 date at the bottom of the Nordykes’ copies. Perfect timing before school closed for the summer to have registered for the next year’s kindergarten class.
Having worked for a few newspaper in the old days myself, strips of "copy" type
were printed from the Linotypes ...
... cut with an X-acto knife ...
... then waxed and rolled to stay in place (hence the phrase
"cut and paste", but unlike how we know it today)...
Depending on the size of the paper, and the number of people on staff,
it may have taken 2-3 days to get the final version of the page finalized
before going to the printing presses, especially if it was a "weekly".
The heading on the column in the Honolulu Advertiser was "Health Bureau Statistics", with a subheading, in larger type, of "Births, Marriages, Deaths".
Keep in mind that newspapers didnt use computers but linotype machines. There was no cut and paste. Everything had to be typed in so information had to be in the reporters hands with plenty of lead time. The Aug. 13th edition had to be completed by the 12th to allow time for it to be printed. So, the earliest the hospital clerk could do her work would be Aug. 5th and the latest it could have gotten to the newspaper would be the 12th. Thats at the max 8 days. Ive worked in a county clerks office and filed births and I can tell you that would entail some dedicated workers for the turn around to be complete in that time.
Barry's reported birth date fits in the range of the dates of the other births reported in that edition of the Advertiser, which were the 1st through the 6th of August.
You really ought to at least look at the data before spinning your theories. Nothing wrong with theories, but they have to fit the data.
BTW, both newspapers also put Marriage License Applications in the same section of the paper, yet no one can find such an application for Stanley Ann and Barack H. Obama Sr. The legend, and alleged divorce papers, say there were married in Maui, Hawaii. Maybe Maui didn't have a newspaper? Nope the Maui News has been around since 1900. The web version doesn't have births, or marriage applications, but the print might, or might have in '61.