Folks, Here is some very interesting Tips for Cemetery research from ANCESTRY NewsLetter a few days ago. I have not checked the sites yet, if you do , let us all know what you think. Wanda GEORGE G. MORGAN: "ALONG THOSE LINES . . ." "Cemetery Research Online" ===================================================================== When I was growing up, many of my friends thought I was strange because I liked cemeteries. A few friends were even fearful of walking on the same side of the street as the cemetery. They couldn't understand what I found so interesting in the old Presbyterian Cemetery in my hometown of Madison, North Carolina. The old tombstones with the names of the town fathers, dates in the early 1800s, unusual engraved icons, and interesting epitaphs still fascinate me, and perhaps that's why I am working on a manuscript on the subject, hoping to include many of the thousands of photographs, old postcards, and stereograph images I have collected over the years. The Internet has opened up a new world for all of us. We now have access to vast amounts of information from our own computers at any hour of the day or night. Information about cemeteries and details about their denizens are among the expanding body of information available, and we can conduct online cemetery research about our family lines online as well. In "Along Those Lines . . ." this week, let me share with you a number of interesting online sites for your cemetery research, followed by this week's installment of "The Citation Corner," in which I'll illustrate how to create a source citation for a Web site. DEAD FOLKS GO ONLINE This has nothing to do with Chicago politics, where I learned first- hand for over twenty years that dead people vote in elections and some ward committeemen's election day credo is, "Vote early and vote often!" No, dead men also do not create or update Web pages. However, those of us who are interested in cemeteries, cemetery canvassing, tombstone transcriptions, and a variety of other related ancestral studies work hard to place information on the Internet. I know you understand, because every time you upload a GEDCOM file, post a message to a message board, share ancestor details on a surname mailing list, or respond to an e-mail inquiry, you are somehow adding to the body of the electronic information. There are many types of online cemetery research sites to help you with your research. Let's explore some of the best. LOCATING CEMETERIES ONLINE The best starting point in your online cemetery research may be the U.S. Geologic Survey's Geographic Name Information System (GNIS) site at http://geonames.usgs.gov/. From here, you may proceed to the query page at http://geonames.usgs.gov/pls/gnis/web_query.gnis_web_query_form and enter information to help you locate specific cemeteries in a given area. (Please note that the URL shown contains underscore characters ( _ ) and not spaces in the name.) Simply use the pull-down menu choices to choose state or territory, and to choose Feature Type "cemetery" -- and then narrow your selection to a specific county. I located 141 cemeteries in Cook County, Illinois, in this way. The query will provide you with the latitude and longitude of the cemetery, as well as a reference to a USGS map. Click on the cemetery name and another screen. Take some time to investigate the various mapping options. Most helpful, though, is the link labeled "Show Feature Location" which takes you to the U.S. Census Bureau's Tiger Map Server's map of the area in question. The cemetery you want will be indicated by a large red dot. You can zoom in for a more detailed view of the location. Interment.net at http://interment.net is a resource for locating cemeteries in the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Ireland, and other countries. While far from complete, it is one place where transcriptions are being placed online and can be one of your starting points. Cemetery Junction at http://daddezio.com/cemetery/ boasts more than 31,000 U.S. cemeteries, more than 21,000 family cemeteries, over 2,000 Canadian cemeteries, and over 450 Australian cemeteries listed. The USGenWeb (http://www.usgenweb.org) and WorldGenWeb (http://www.worldgenweb.org) Project sites are a wealth of cemetery materials as well. You should refer to the location in which you believe your ancestors lived to determine if some individual or organization has contributed cemetery information to their site. In addition, the Tombstone Transcription Project at USGenWeb (http://www.rootsweb.com/~cemetery) is an impressive resource whose goal is to record the tombstone inscriptions of our ancestors now and make them available online before the images and inscriptions are lost to the ravages of time. Genealogical and historical societies are resources you should never overlook. Society Hall, a Web site developed by Ancestry.com and the Federation of Genealogical Societies (FGS), is a listing of information about genealogical societies (http://www.familyhistory.com/societyhall/main.asp). A society may have compiled extensive information about cemeteries in their area. The Pinellas Genealogy Society, Inc., (http://www.rootsweb.com/~flpgs), for example, has been actively canvassing and transcribing cemeteries in Pinellas County, Florida, for a number of years. Not only have they published these for sale, they have recently begun putting indexes on their Web site. GeneaSearch has a collection of cemetery links at http://geneasearch.com/cemeteries.htm that may be helpful, as well as an e-mail newsletter to which you may subscribe. Find A Grave, at http://www.findagrave.com, claims to have 2.8 million records of the famous, infamous, and not famous persons. You can search by name, location, date, claim to fame, and a variety of other criteria. One facility allows you to search for cemeteries throughout the U.S. and to view the names of persons for whom burial information has been submitted by people just like yourself. As you can see, there are quite a few sites to check. In addition, you can use your favorite search engine and enter the name of the cemetery and the location. Enclose words in quotation marks to make them exact phrases and use a plus sign ( + ) to indicate both are required to be found. For example, I tried to locate information about a cemetery in my hometown: "woodland cemetery" + "madison, NC" The search gave me results including obituaries, advertisements, and funeral related information. These may provide pointers to funeral home contacts, churches, and other resources. Invest some time in researching cemeteries online and, perhaps, in submitting records of your own family members into some of the virtual online cemeteries. You may make connections with some of your own dead relatives online. Howells, Cyndi. Cyndi's List. Cemeteries and Funeral Homes. 07 September 2001. On-line <http://www.cyndislist.com/cemetery.htm>. 08 September 2001. A stand-alone Web page without a known author and without a publication or update date would look like this: Save Our Cemeteries, Inc. Online <http://www.saveourcemeteries.org/ Happy Hunting! George