After I find out the Section, Township & Range of a cemetery, I go to the BLM website (http://www.glorecords.blm.gov/search/search.asp). THere I can enter the state, county, section, township and range I want and, unless it is in section 16 (schools) it will tell me the name and purchase date of the original landowner. I take that name and flip thru the first 1 or 2 indexes to deeds in the Recorder's office. If I know where it is on a map, I go to the Auditor's office for the Auditor's Plat Maps. These are the drawn maps of each section that show each individual parcel of ground and give each parcel a number which you can cross reference in 3-ring binders on shelves in the same office (at least in Bartholomew County). Looking here first will show you whether or not the cemetery is viewed legally as a cemetery by the county. If it is, it will show up as an individual parcel, regardless of who owns it. Most of the ones I am finding that are mapped are listed as tax-exempt and the owner is usually something like "trustees of a cemetery" or "cemetery association" and these are viewed for the most part as non-existent groups, with no addresses or contacts. They are pulled from deeds when the GIS department mapped the area. A lot of them are those mysterious "excepted" pieces of ground that no one seems to own. As for a cemetery on private ground, if it has not been surveyed or subdivided recently, there is a good chance it will not show up on any current deed or plat map. That would mean taxes are paid on it. The recently re-discovered Lewelling graveyard was an "excepted" quarter of an acre for which taxes were never paid. It first appeared in the transfer of the land outside of the family around 1870 and the cemetery was in the middle of the land and only mentioned in the deed as being in the north part of the remaining 60 acre tract. It was probably farmed under about 1940 and no one today can remember ever seeing it. This made it impossible to place on the Plat Map, so it wasn't. Looking at those maps alone, you would have no idea that there was a cemetery there. I have also found transfer books at the auditor's office very useful. THey are the old books that were kept to cross-reference the transaction of land before spread sheets. I recently found that a cemetery here, the Mt. Pleasant U.B. cemetery (a church that was in existence from about 1880 to 1940) was not on the Auditor's Plat map, but being cared for by the township trustee. THe current deeds do not contain any mention of it, even though it is a beautiful cemetery that has probably 50 or more graves in it. I started with the original landowner and moved forward through the old transfer books until I found where he sold 1 acre of ground to the trustees of the Mt. Pleasant U.B. church. I took the date of the transfer to the recorder's office and looked in their books and found the deed that described in poles the outline of the cemetery. It conflicts with the current property lines and the GIS department is looking into it now. You guys are providing the best questions and answers for this topic. I plan on taking my list of cemeteries back to the commissioners by January with a list of questions that need answers that a cemetery BOARD should be there to provide, or else they will have to deal with answering them. So far these are the ones I have for them: 1 - Who owns a cemetery that has been "excepted" out of a piece of ground? Can a landowner claim adverse possession on ground this ground? 2 - Who owns a cemetery that was deeded to a board of trustees or association that no longer exists? 3 - Can the auditor, recorder, surveyor, assessor or plan commission be held resonsible from now on for encroachments into the 100 ft. buffer zone of cemeteries? 4 - Shouldn't each township trustees have written and clear standards of maintenance on each cemetery in their care? Shouldn't we, as taxpayers, be able to hold them up to those standards and wouldn't that be much easier with a cemetery board that oversees this work? 5 - Shouldn't the 100 foot buffer zone around a cemetery be surveyed, mapped and shown as an easement on each parcel of ground it affects? Wouldn't that save the average citizen money and a big headache if they should run into human remains while building their dream home? Got any more, anyone? Cris West Columbus, IN