Over the years, I've visited hundreds of cemeteries both in my county and outside my county, in my state and outside my state. I just am totally obsessed with them. Below is a map of some of my county cemeteries. Not ALL are listed here. Many are not listed have been uncovered over the years and did not make an original survey and map done in the 80s and updated in the 90s.
Anyway, I didn't realize I had not hit them ALL yet. I guess I have my plan for the fall! Here is the map! (Blue circles around the cemeteries that are numbered are the ones I HAVE been to.)
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There is a large number of older generations who still use the early publications of the researchers from 1970-1990s that were self published. That's fine for a base to start. However, what we have found that because these researchers did not have easy access to all the files available to them, their research was often flawed. In cases where there were five or six John Smith's in the same area, it was easy to miss a distinction between John and John Jr, or Cousin John or in some cases John who was of a totally different family.
One major issue is that many of these self published books were not sourced. They may give a brief description of what they found, but 9 out of 10 times, they did not give a complete source report. Repeating the research in the modern time period we are in, is nearly impossible. Another issue is that because of the scarcity of the documents at the time, some things were missed, never seen or showed that they were on the wrong path and disregarded as being someone else. Many of the books are now totally wrong with incorrect or incomplete information. I want to caution anyone reading to look at these self published books from the time period as a stepping stone but not a valid source. While I'm mentioning sources - I want to also caution those who swear by DAR (Daughters of the American Revolution) applications. Not only were they often incorrect, wrong dates, wrong person used, incomplete, but there was a period of time where the DAR short forms application team was not diligent about confirming the information and there for the lineages will need to be proven before being readmitted. With that all said, if you find sourced information in these resources, and can find the actual documents spoken about, by all means use the document and original source instead of the lineage book and also, use the lineage book as a back up extra "by the way" kind of source. But do not rely on it for your base information. Now get out there and Enjoy those Adventures in Genealogy. One thing I often talk about to new people is the use of Assumptions. We all know the saying "You know what they say about the word assume? ... It makes an Ass out of U and Me."... I have to disagree when it comes to genealogical research.
Look, most of the time we are finding bits and pieces of information at a time. Occasionally all we will EVER have is a small glimpse, one or two documents and we have to base everything we know off of those few items. What I want you to do is be smart about your assumptions. Base the facts off of a logical timeline between those documents. You MUST assume at some point in order to find information. Sure, sometimes we might assume wrong. It's a given in this field. Just make a note that this fact is being assumed and how you came to that conclusion. I want you to practice using the information you gather and fill in the blanks in between. If you only have two census documents 1860 and 1880, and you know they were in Topeka in 1860 and San Francisco in 1880 - and two children born in 1880, 1882 were listed as being born in Topeka, you can probably assume that this information is incorrect. Do you have a document showing it? No. But does it make sense? Nope. Could they have moved back to Topeka? Maybe. Maybe not. You don't know they did, you can only base the information on what you currently know, which is they were in San Francisco. Do I want you to always assume? No Ma'am! (or Sir). Use the facts first. Then use that brain the Creator gave you and fill in until you have evidence. Practice makes perfect and unless you have a doc, you will HAVE to assume. I am going to Assume you Enjoy your Adventures In Genealogy. This tombstone was new to me when I first saw it in 2013. I had no idea what it was made out of except that it was definitely not made of stone. What it was made out of was White Bronze Metal. There are groups on Facebook for the spotting and sharing of these markers because they are just so rare and interesting to find. These White Bronze markers were sold by a companies between 1870s and 1914. They were advertised as a sort of cheaper and standard way of ordering a monument while having the flexibility to order different parts when needed. In the example to the left, the metal plate that has words on it was replaceable. There are four sides and each one was able to be changed (such as when a second child died in this case). The monuments are extremely durable. As you can see there is very little rust. One other one in this cemetery even had a gun shot through it and was still fine. As you can see in this photo, the dates are clearly pre-monument making time periods. This is likely placed after the fact by family who now could suddenly afford placing a marker for their children. The end of the White Bronze marker making came because of WWI where many of the factories were taking over for the War Efforts to make critical equipment and supplies. I admit, I honestly don't have a ton of time. In fact, I have a blog (this one) that I often have to catch up on, such as now, where I am writing. I do love volunteering. I just don't often have the time to do it during the time that the places want me to.
I have been a member of our local Historical Society. One thing that I was able to do was earn the trust of members and be granted a Key to the building. In my free time while they were closed even, I was able to go in and take a complete and full inventory of items in their possession. I made a written inventory and a digital inventory. A spread sheet with important information and photos of each item will help if there is ever a need for an insurance claim. Another thing I was able to do while this process happened was to complete a standard repository label system. Any archivist (pro or amateur) could go in and know exactly how to find the info using this standard format. In the last Covid Year, I have not had much free time, believe it or not. Isn't that funny how that works? However, I've recently left my job that was taking up the majority of my time and hope that volunteerism will be back available to me. What can you volunteer for in your local community and what do you bring to the table that could help out? There is always something you can do. Everyone has some value. Enjoy your Adventures in Genealogy by volunteering. I mentioned in my previous post last week that I also enjoy newspapers. I don't spend a ton of money on excess research subscriptions. I really REALLY enjoy my free research. HOWEVER, with that said, I do subscribe on a regular basis to Newspapers.com. I don't remember a time that I did a search for a topic or person or place, where I did not go into newspapers.com an use at least a dozen terms to find information.
What I like about a newspaper is that just about everyone ended up in it at one time or another. In later years, people who had children had it announced without their permission even. In earlier times, those who wanted distant relatives to know something quickly would have it put in the newspaper. Towns would comment about people coming and going for business. Sickness and large events were there. In some cases, newspapers were the only connection to what was happening outside of their small world. Some editors/publishers found a funny joke or two and added them in to break up the seriousness of the information. Advertisements for your family store could be found in there. Marriages, divorces, births, deaths, military training and when they would come home on leave, Estate lists and documents, loss of livestock, fires, tragedy and triumph. ... . there just is so much information. Newspapers.com is only ONE of the many places to find information. NewspaperArchives, Google News Archives, Fulton History, NARA, Library of Congress, and many local newspapers have their own archives as well. Explore all the options and find out what suites your research best. When you do research you want to make sure you are finding every possible piece of information. Why not make searching newspapers part of your routine? Get out there and enjoy that Adventure in Genealogy. My absolute favorite things are census. Wait, maybe it's newspapers. hmmm maybe it's really Wills and Estates. Anyway - Census records are full of information while still lacking on things you need to know because they are done so far apart.
Many of you know that a Census was taken every Ten years. Some of you know that states at certain time periods also took a census of their population in between those time periods as well. Usually around times like 1866 or 1867, 1878 etc. Many states did these. Go to Google and type in the state and census year, and see what comes up [example "Alabama State Census Years"]. Then go see if there is one available for the person you are looking for. Another thing to know is that some of these federal census have alternate documents. For example there are some who have "agricultural census". There are many pieces of information on some that can tell you about the lives of those who were in that household so make sure you examine each and every column, not just name date and place of birth. Fill in the blanks between empty years. To do this, check out the city directories for the years between a census for your head of household. If a male child comes of age in the same place, look to see if they are in the city directory. Most of these are for the early to mid 1900s, but you can get lucky sometimes with older cities who have a long history such as New York City. The city directories can tell you if they are married, if the street was renumbered at some point, what occupation they had (and you can track them pretty easy that way), and what family lived near them. Census is a wealth of information about your family. I probably don't have to tell you about that. If you have some old research though, go back and take a fresh look and see if you missed any information that now makes more sense. Enjoy your Adventures! One of the biggest comments I find on a post about cemetery searches is "Call the cemetery office". I'd like you all to stop saying this to people and here is why.
While it's true that some churches and some cemeteries have an office, many MANY do not. Let me just say that in states like where I am (Alabama) there are zero cemetery rules. In fact, there is no mandatory registrations out there of burials. This leads to cemeteries who have zero need for a records office. The majority of cemeteries in my immediate area are in fact open to burials on your own and you don't even have to have a funeral home involved if you don't want to. Several years ago, I interviewed a man who was working on a local cemetery to clean up one of the oldest sections that had been buried under decades of leaf debris, downed trees and left to return to the earth on it's own. His great grandfather was a civil war soldier and was buried in this old section. He made it his personal mission to clean up the whole place. The cemetery was on a small hill outside of a very small town hidden in some trees. There were no gates, no night time lights, no fences or security. He spent many many months, and long long days in that place. He not only cleaned up that area, but became a sort of guardian over the cemetery. What he did find out was that many young Mexican mothers who most likely were illegal here would come in at all hours of the day and bury infants where ever in the cemetery. This is hugely sad, just for the fact that these children will never have a written memory, but also because these young families were just picking any spot and digging a few inches down. This cemetery was previously already filled up. Not all burials had markers. These families were burying young infants and children on top of other unmarked graves. We know this to be true. On the flip side, I once visited a cemetery in Muskogee, Oklahoma. it was a city cemetery and it also had a main office. While the office was very small and only open on occasion, I happened to hit a good day. Not only did they have a record of where the ancestor was buried, they had kept file information from that burial in 1908. These records of the unmarked plot said who was in each grave, what they died of, who paid for the burial, and also a bunch of other things. What I'd like you to advise people about instead of to visit the office, Ask them to find local burial regulations first. If there are NONE in that city, county or state, they may be better off going to newspapers instead and saving the gas money. I'd also like you to ask them to find a local cemetery buff. People in just about every town are interested in this and many know more than you can ever find in documents. And just to make a hundred or more of you even more mad at me - FindAGrave(FG) is NOT a valid source of information. Sure, you might get some there - someone posts an obituary or a photo. But all the info is User Entered. Any familial connections are prone to errors. Use it as a "Hint" to things and NOT as a primary source. I'm not a fan of FG. Never have been. It is always the LAST entry I look at on sites like Ancestry. And many times I will totally disregard the information. So while you are searching for churches and cemetery offices, make sure you know if they are required to keep information or not. You sure could save yourself a lot of headaches and time with those Adventures in Genealogy. Every so often my good friends who know me will purposefully say something about a research topic and just leave it hanging. They clearly know that I can't just walk away with unanswered questions. Off I go on a rabbit hole search. Sometimes I find great information an occasionally, I find absolutely nothing at all.
I've heard many professional genealogists tell their followers that you can save time not repeating a search if you write things down such as sources, where you looked, what the results were and that sort of thing. I'm all for that. You absolutely should keep track of what you've searched and what you have or have not found. What I'd like to add to this however is this: If you have a negative result, didn't find any information in a particular source, don't give up on it. repeat your searches often. Go back every few days and try the same search again. Better yet, add to that search by using different search terms and variations. The problem with giving up after a search in this digital age is that every single day of our lives, there are hundreds of thousands of people scanning documentation and transcribing it into repositories. There are things added each year that if we had given up, we may not see the new items. Take some time and review your family tree from yourself backwards several generations. Update the information. If you don't find new items, great. Mark it and move on. But on the off chance that a new fact has appeared, it could very well lead to a breakthrough! And wouldn't that be awesome?! Repeat your searches - and enjoy that Adventure in Genealogy... I can remember when I first started this process how overwhelmed I felt with trying to figure out where I could locate documents to prove my family line. I was handed a big stack of paper copies of things in no particular order, none of which had any sources listed. I pretty much had to start over and find out where all that info came from.
But I didn't know. I didn't know that I didn't know it. Sooo I was clueless. That is why there are so many of us out here blogging, YouTubing, and Podcasting to help you out. We've been in your shoes. Some things we didn't know when we started are listed below. I hope that helps someone new. 1. Grandma's documents are technically a source. But, they aren't a source unless you know where she got them. See if you can recreate the process of finding that document she has given you. Then properly credit that source so no one has to go through finding it a third (or eighteenth) time. 2. Gravestones aren't always "set in stone". Just because it says their date of birth or date of death doesn't mean it's the correct date. In the 1800s and well into the mid century of the 1900s people were not always married to a single person. Their kids were not there when they were born or married. The informant didn't always know where the deceased was born. If you are lucky, the dates perfectly align for all your documentation. My guess is that won't be the case. Take the date that is closest to the source, meaning - the person who it belongs to. For instance, I know I was born on January 5th, 1972. My spouse wasn't there when I was born. My kids may get confused on what year I was born, and in fact, they may not even realize I was born in a different state than when they were born. Who was there? My parents. So the closest document for accuracy should be my birth certificate or any document (like my drivers license) that comes directly from my mouth. Get it? 3. Census records are subjective. With the exception of the 1940 census, you just have no idea who it is that is giving the information to the census taker. Could be the husband/head of house - who has had no use for birthday information before because his wife handles that. He may remember them in general, but pressed for the info, maybe gets his kids months all mixed up. Could be no one was home that day, and so the census enumerator asked the neighbor who lived in that house so they wouldn't have to come back the next day. Also, there were just some people in certain years who would purposefully give out wrong information. Consipiracy theorists or something else? We don't know. Just do the best you can and compare the information to find what makes the most sense. 4. Everyone has a story. 95% of the country were told they had an Indian princess as a great grandmother. It's simply not true for the majority of them. (Yes, I know it's true you were told that.) Unless your DNA shows a percentage, and unless you can find a documentation trail, you have just got to let it go. Try proving it or disproving it. But don't perpetuate the legend. 5. Your name was not changed at Ellis Island. In fact, what if they didn't even come in through Ellis Island? Two big things in that first line - and I'm here to tell you because I want you to be open to the possibility that things just didn't matter back then. Spelling could be because it was "heard through the ears of someone who didn't speak the same language. Or heard through the ears of someone who had a totally different language and accent of their own. Imagine someone from the Deep South with a heavy southern accent trying to communicate with someone from somewhere like Scottland or Ireland who also had heavy dialect accents. Oh lord. I can't even. Try communicating with someone who doesn't speak the same language? I bet you'd be frustrated and start doing charades. Same back then. There were also hundreds of ports and people came through them for various reasons. When you get time, look up ports of entry in to the country. You'll find a whole new world to explore. |
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AuthorMichele is an obsessed mother of 4 residing in North Alabama. Hobbies include long walks in the woods, on the beach and in strange cemeteries and libraries. Genealogy friends need only apply. Categories
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