Close to 24 million births, marriages and deaths recorded in Cook County, Illinois, (including Chicago) are being digitized with plans to make them available online to researchers by early 2008. According to an article in the Chicago Tribune, the documents will be available for free online searching. Once the person is located, the record could then be downloaded and printed for a fee. Certified copies will not be available online, nor will Social Security numbers be made available on the online documents. The records available will include "birth certificates that are at least 75 years aol, marriage certificates more than 50 years old, and death certificates more than 20 years old." The records date back to 1871, as the Chicago Fire of October 8, 1871 destroyed all county vital records prior to that date.