WAVERLY - Elvira Hebell remembers the triumph of finding her husband's great-grandmother. Or rather, discovering the German woman's obituary.

Hebell, a Denver resident with an knack for genealogy, found Frau Sophie Weltzin's death notice in a now defunct German language Waverly newspaper. She'd searched other Iowa papers but to no avail.

But there it was, she said, printed in The Waverly Phoenix, a publication in print from 1892 to 1924.

"Right there in front of my nose," Hebell says.

The obituary was helpful in Hebell's research because it contained an important bit of family history -- the name of Weltzin's birthplace in Germany.

So important are obituaries when plotting a family tree, that Hebell and a friend volunteered to ease the efforts of fellow genealogists trying to trace German roots through Bremer County. A 715-page document -- containing almost 2,800 Waverly Phoenix obituaries in German -- is available at the Waverly Public Library.

Hebell and Connie Wedemeier of Oran compiled, indexed and alphabetized the death notices from Bremer and other surrounding counties.

"This is just our gift," Wedemeier said. "We thought it would be a tool a lot of researchers would appreciate."

Maiden and spousal names, dates and cities of origin sometimes offered in obituaries can help fill historical gaps.

"You kind of go in circles to find what you are looking for, and it may not be in the obvious place," Wedemeier said of the research process.

The two members of the Bremer County Genealogical Society -- named Outstanding Iowa Chapter of 2003 -- started the tedious process in May 2001.

Hebell, who can read some German, went through reels of microfilm at the library to weed out obituaries.

That's no small feat, said assistant librarian Mary Cheville. The paper only printed one or two pages of local news. Oftentimes, obituaries were buried between accounts of social visits and pages listing New York ship schedules. Sometimes, though inconsistently, the paper drew attention to deaths by printing little cross symbols on either side of the names.

Hebell would print obituaries, and she and Wedemeier worked to cut, tape, copy and cross-reference the records.

"We've been through lots and lots of Scotch tape," Wedemeier say.

Wedemeier is a CUNA Mutual Group employee, and a $500 grant from the company for her volunteer efforts helped fund the project.

The fact that Waverly once saw a need for German language newspapers is evidence of Bremer County's German heritage, Cheville said. A wave of immigrants and their descendants arrived in the 1860s and 1870s seeking rich farmland.

"A few people came here, and they sent back word that this is a good place," Cheville say. "A lot of Germans came through Cook County, (Illinois.)"

Compilation projects save time and headaches, genealogists say. And as genealogy gains popularity, the public library is becoming a choice stop for residents and others tracing ancestry through Bremer County, Cheville said.

Hebell, corresponding secretary for the Bremer County Genealogical Society, often fields research questions from across the state.

Cheville said the library's local family history section is easy access "because you can't read 150 years of newspapers to find something."