Steps for
Cemetery Surveys
With Digital Headstone Pictures and Booklet Publication
Back
to Wise County Cemeteries Home Page
A little over a year ago I did my first cemetery survey using a digital camera and the computer to record my data. Since then LaDarla and I have learned how to streamline our work and get lots of information out on the internet and into the libraries, funeral homes and local historical society. We have over 20,000 headstone photos on CDs and several books published and donated locally.
We've been asked many times about our procedures and about camera selection. I'm putting this page up to avoid repeating the information.
Materials needed:
1.
Digital camera or video cam (There is no one perfect camera but here are some points to
consider.)
a. A relatively inexpensive camera from Wal-Mart is fine but it should take
a picture at least as big as 640X480 pixels.
b. Get one with a "look through" view finder because as you look
down and take pictures of headstones on the ground, the sun will shine in those LCD
screens and make them difficult to see.
c. You need to be able to take about 250 pictures (this is as long as WE can
last) in one trip to the cemetery, so you will have to buy extra picture storage
"cards" for some cameras.
d. If your camera uses AA batteries you can buy those rechargeable batteries
and charger for very little. The other type of rechargeable batteries are rather
expensive.
2.
Clip board or writing pad.
3.
Soft large chalk. (We use the washable sidewalk chalk from Wal-Mart)(Don't use the bright
colors in highly visible areas or you may cause alarm from passers by.)
4.
Procedure:
1. When you first go into a new
cemetery try to draw a rough map of the layout. You made need to divide it into Sections
(use roads or walkways to do that). Then decide which way you are going to go on your Rows
and indicate that with arrows on your map. Try not to have the rows be real long
because if they are not straight you may loose your place.
2. We
write down the name on the first headstone in each row so we will know when to start a new
row in our data but we no longer write any other names. We now find that we can read
headstones and even the little funeral home markers just as well from the pictures as you
can in person (most digital cameras do real good close-ups)
3. We go up the row taking pictures of both sides of double stones (being sure to get the marriage date if there is one),
the military footstones and any information
that might be on the back (like children's names). We get down and take close-ups if we
think something will be hard to read.
4.
As we go back down the next row to our note pad or clip board we chalk any headstones that
we think may be hard to read. This is that big soft chalk like kids use on sidewalks. It
will wash off in the rain (trouble is it didn't rain all summer here in Texas.) This chalk
really helps in reading old stones, marblely colored ones or those shiny gray ones.
5. In each cemetery
we also take pictures of the way in if it's difficult to find, the gates, historical
markers, and scenic pictures of the area.
6.
At home I download my pictures into my computer. LaDarla has a Sony camera and hers are on
floppy disks ready to go.
7.
I pull up my pictures on the computer screen (we both have 17 inch monitors) and then I
open my database program on part of the screen. I then type in the information directly
from the headstone pictures.
Section | Row | # | Last Name | First name | Born | Date of Death | Information |
3-N |
15 |
1871 |
Hubbard |
Mamie Louvenia |
Sept 13, 1911 |
Dec 3, 1980 |
Wed Aug 6, 1932 - Children: Cilmon Jean, James Arvel, Mammie Joyce & Ronald Dale |
3-N |
15 |
1872 |
Hubbard |
Aaron Cilmon |
Aug 3, 1910 |
Aug 14, 1990 |
Wed Aug 6, 1932 |
3-N |
15 |
1873 |
Davis |
Murl Dean |
Dec 1, 1924 |
June 9, 1988 |
Headstone with Cleople Buford - PVT US Army |
8. We enter - Section Number - Row Number - Headstone Number # (assigned
number as the headstones lay in order) - Last Name - First Name - Birth Date - Death Date
- Information (this includes "Headstone with", "Daughter of" etc., and
military record. If you put the marriage date on both people it shows that they are a
couple when this data gets sorted in alphabetical order).
9.
Would be glad to send anyone our template for this information (mailto:Sue@WiseCountyTexas.info). It has "TEXT" for a
format in the date columns. You run into some problems if the program tries to format your
dates and you have different styles of entries like just the year on some.
10. As
we finish entering the data from each picture we number it with the headstone number (#)
we have assigned it. In our picture program all you have to do is hit "S", type
in the number, and hit enter. The picture is saved to your desktop with it's new number
and you can then gather them into folders for that cemetery and section. We save
additional pictures (like of military footstones or close-ups) with the same number as the
main headstone picture but we add a small letter (like a, b, c, etc.) behind it. That way
it saves with the other pictures of that stone.
Sharing the Info:
1. Now that you have the data
information from a cemetery it's important to publish it in two ways. It's really helpful
sometimes to know which headstones are together in the cemetery. With this information you
may be able to find a married daughter with a different last name or a mother-in-law that
is buried with her daughter's family. It's also important to have this location
information so people can go to the cemetery and actually find the headstones.
2.
We just use "Word" to make drawings of the cemeteries. With it you can put on
any color or size of line. You can write in different colors and directions in text boxes
with or without lines around them.
3.
With these "layout maps" we list the headstones in their order by Section, Row
and Number (#). I would be glad to send anyone our template for this document in
"Word". It has two columns, the pages are numbered and it's ready to be printed
on both sides of the paper.
4.
The other important way of listing your information is in alphabetical order. With large
cemeteries you would never be able to find people in layout order. In this data table you
need to include the headstone number (#) so people can go back to the layout list if they
want to see where the headstone is in the cemetery. Again we have templates for these
pages that can be easily emailed.
5. One
other document we have is a listing of Last Names, First Names, and the Cemetery that the
headstone is in. With this you can combine all the names from all your cemeteries into one
alphabetical master index. Ours for Wise County now has over 22,000 names and at three
columns it's over 100 pages.
6. In putting
things up on the internet you can copy and paste from your data documents and get the same
information out there for everyone to read. One added thing that we found to be very
useful on web pages is a "searcher" that will search all the text on your web
pages. This is real helpful in finding names and it's free to put on there.
We've taken pictures of
some headstones that are broken and on the ground. We are sure that they will be lost in
the next year or so. That is why we feel it is important to document these headstones with
pictures and to share our pictures in CDs with the libraries, funeral homes and historical
society.
Please email any questions or comments.
mailto:Sue@WiseCountyTexas.info