Find A Grave

seeing as how i dont get a chance to volunteer or help out with charities that really inspire me, I have been thinking of something to do to give back. I just happened to be working on a little research for my genealogy, and came across this little website, its nothing fancy, but it has 34million grave site photos. http://www.findagrave.com I am soon going to be walking the local cemeteries and taking photos.. Great exercise, great nature walks, and plenty of photos in the hopes of helping out my fellow genealogists. Usually when you have a person to research, you find their last known whereabouts, i.e. their grave. A photo is worth a thousand words, and in this case, a date of birth or a year, etc. If you are like me, and have just a few spare hours, or several to spare and want to get out and about, take your camera to the nearest cemetery and take photos, then upload them to the site. Also, if you need a photo, you can download it, and have it as your own, there are even celebrities listed there.

I Seek Dead People

I have been doing Genealogy for years, since I was about 14, I became very interested in our families history, when my Grandma got involved heavily into it. At 15, I went on a very long road trip with my Grandma, and it involved digging in cemeteries. It was a lot of fun, looking for people, searching thru weeds, snacks, bugs and swamps... yes swamps.. some people were buried in cemeteries that were turned into natural wildlife/flora preserves and then flooded. I basically took it is, the town, city, county or state, didnt feel the need to upkeep it, or didnt have the money to do so, so they just let nature take its course.

Finding Relatives the old school way, involved traveling and lots of microfilm, making photo copies with large bulky copiers and doing a lot of writing. Now in the days of the internet, fax machines, email it is much easier to get the info. Sometimes I still do it the old school way, getting the actual copies of the things i need, from a death certificate to a marriage licence or land deed.

If you are new to this you are not alone, I still consider myself an intermediate Genealogist, but I am very resourceful since I have a background with detective work. I love to help people get in the direction they want to get going, but for me, what is hard, is asking for help. I am still looking for my maternl grandfathers family, the trail stops actually when they leave Germany and enter the USA in the late 1800's. Rumor has it, they changed the spelling of their name, and there is a town in Germany named after them, and I'd like to know why. Someday I know that I will find out why. But for now, I have been working on getting all the research that I have collected from my Grandmother into proper order.

My title "I Seek Dead People" is as plain as it can get. I have dug in dozens of cemeteries, taking photos, rubbings and etchings, putting the last place photo with the person, and then go in reverse. It seems to work best for me this way, and when others need help, they know exactly what I do.