MY HOW AND WHY OF "DOING" FINDAGRAVE

With the recent discussion among my genealogy friends about the competitive nature of some FindAgrave volunteers and how it sometimes hurts the relatives of the recently deceased, I thought I'd share some thoughts of how and why of my own experience at FindAGrave.

I joined FindAGrave over eight years as something to do that got me out of my apartment. At first i was just fulfilling photo requests but then I started taking photos of the older headstones in the cemeteries those were requests were in. I began  doing that more often when I realized there were quite a few names from my own family tree on those old markers.

After a nearby town's cemetery was vandalized I started taking photos of the older markers at Mt. Vernon here in Abington, feeling that they were more likely to be permanently lost than the larger, modern headstones. I filed them on my computer in folders orgamized by the date they were taken. Then I've gone through the folders, checked the names on the headstones,against the FindAGrave site for Mt. Vernon and created a memorial if one had not already been done. If there is a memorial with no photo, I add the one I have to it.

Now, these are the rules I personally follow for my FindAGrave contributions:

1.I do not take photos of headstones who have died in the last 50 years except for photo requests.

2. If I am contacted with an edit for a memorial, I verify it wherever possible and then make that edit.

3 If a relative asks me to transfer ownership of their loved one's memorial, I do it as soon as I see the request.

4. If I have inadvertently created a duplicate memorial, I delete it.

5. I do not create memorials for graves I have not actually seen. No use of obituaries. No assumption that just because a person lived in a specific town, than he has to have been buried in that town's cemetery. Now that FindAGrave is used as a hint on Ancestry, that assumption of where a person is buried will lead to the spread of bad information,

6. I don't look at contributing to FindAGrave as a competitive sport. I don't worry about how many memorials or photos I've added. I do take a look at the end of the year at those stats and how many volunteer photos I've taken, but that's it.

I'll repeat, FindAGrave is NOT a competitive sport. It's a way to help others, whether mourners or family researchers, and to perhaps help  preserve local history.

That's how and why i "do" FindAGrave. How about you?