Ernie: My question is more basic. You're indicating that the grids shown on the plats are graves - but when I was at the Archives I measured a single grid on the original, and it was 1" by 1/2". That, combined with the fact that there are often two or three veterans burials marked in one grid space, tell me that the grid system marked on the plat is not a grid of graves, but a grid denoting size. I.E. if there is a grid that is 10 x 10 with a scale of 1"=20 feet, it is not 100 graves, but an area that is 200 feet long and 100 feet wide. The graves will fall where they may inside the grid. Help! Dale Dale Drake Morgan Co History & Genealogy Assn Ernie & Connie Lasley wrote: > Dale, > > We have the WPA plats for 144 cemeteries that were done in Gibson County in > 1939 & 1940, and used these many times to locate old cemeteries. Two main > obstacles were that the roads have moved in the last 60 years, and some old > reference points and landmarks have changed. Most have been right where > they said they were if we could figure out those changes. Sometimes they > were not real clear on starting measuring points. One plat had a line and > an arrow which indicated 1 3/10 miles from a curve in the road to a point > where they measured 475' off the road to the corner of the cemetery. The > actual starting point was at the edge of a small town 2/10 mile from the > curve, so we were off that far on the starting point. The cemetery was > actually 463' from the road, the road much wider and straighter than it was > in 1939. In another one, it showed rhe road 75' from the cemetery where > the road was actually directly beside the cemetery. Old County plats > confirmed that the road had been straightened and improved. > > The actual grave plats are a different story. You are correct that the > microfilm process has skewed the actual size scale. And there seems to be > differences on what the squares represent. It seems to depend on how easy > it was for them to determine actual demensions. The first one we worked > with was fairly simple to determine, a grave was 2' 8" wide and 10' long, > (7' grave, 3' walkway between the next row). Others appeared to be > slightly over 5' wide and 11' long. By measuring the stones or bases > still in place, it looks like these were laid out with a lot of 2 graves > and a 4' walkway. On some, walkways and drives were platted. We found > one where the drives no longer existed, but noticed the dates on the graves > where the drives were platted were burials within the last 25 > years. Apparently as they ran out of room they began to eliminate some > drives and sell the space as lots. > > An easy test of lot widths and depths is to find a cemetery that has been > maintained over the years where you can be fairly certain that the stones > are in the original location, and has at least three or four Veteran's > markers. Measure the distances between them and compare that to the > number of spaces/rows on the WPA plat. The older deteriorated cemeteries > will not be so easy, but will give you reference points when searching for > graves and buried/missing markers. The objective of the project was to > locate Veteran's markers, and at least that information seems to be > accurate on most of ours. > > I think on some they estimated the size of a cemetery based on how many > lots and rows it would take to square off a cemetery to include only a few > markers. There were probably never that many lots/graves, but > measurements between graves indicated that X number of graves and rows > could be there. We have one that shows four rows of five graves, twenty > graves total, but only seven graves exist in the cemetery. Others are not > completely platted, one showing a 20' by 20' cemetery, and dotted lines > indicating four rows. One plat on a still-active cemetery shows larger > sections that seem to be eight and 12 grave family plots, but do not have > individual graves marked out. > > It seems to all depend on what crew measured and drew the plat, how well > they could obtain accurate measurements on original stone locations, and > whether or not they could determine actual outer boundaries of the cemetery > and the actual number of lots contained within. > > Ernie > > At 09:15 AM 04/05/2002 -0500, you wrote: > >To all: > > > >I have a question on how to interpret the WPA cemetery plats. At first I > >thought the grid indicated graves, but in examining cemeteries with marked > >military burials, sometimes two burials are in one square. So we've > >interpreted > >the grid of rectangles to indicate overall size, and it is tied to the > >legend at > >the bottom of each cemetery, i.e. 1 inch = 20 feet. > > > >Now, if you're working from copies which were generated from microfilm, you've > >lost the actual size of the drawing. On the originals at the State > >Archives the > >grid squares are 1 inch (long side) by 1/2 inch (short side). You can easily > >calculate the size of the cemetery from this, although it's obvious that > >the WPA > >survey team was guessing many times. (As we do when we're standing in the > >middle of a thicket trying to figure out where the edges are.) But it's a > >start > >- when you're showing the plat to the neighbors you can at least say that in > >1940 someone thought the cemetery was, say, 40 feet by 50 feet. > > > >Has anyone else worked with these plats? Are we interpreting them > >correctly? I > >find them incredibly valuable when trying to prove the existence of a cemetery > >which no longer has stones, particularly. > > > >And on plats ... the other old record to check for cemetery locations are the > >assessor plat books at your local courthouse. These are drawings of each > >section of land, with property boundaries. We have a series on microfilm > >which > >were done every four years from 1903 through 1925 - cemeteries are prominently > >marked on these. Again, for one particular cemetery in this county it's the > >only formal proof we have that the cemetery existed. > > > >Dale > > > >Dale Drake > >Morgan Co History & Genealogy Assn > > > > > > > >==== INPCRP Mailing List ==== > >Please do not send queries through this list. > > ==== INPCRP Mailing List ==== > Cemetery: (n) A marble orchard not to be taken for granite.