New Article Available at the GYR Online Journal

Tech T.I.P. columnist, Denise Olson, writes a great article about the Cemetery Portal at WeRelate.

WeRelate is consistently named the best of the best in any list of family history web sites.  Not only does it provide a free platform for building your family tree and documenting the lives of the people who populate it, it also provides facilities to document related information such as sources, places, research guides, and images to help the researcher.  We Rabbits will be especially interested in the growing collection of cemetery pages found here.  Cemeteries are doing so well, a Cemetery Portal has been set up to help users find these helpful resources.

You can read the entire article at the Graveyard Rabbits Online Journal.

Call for Submissions – GYR Carnival August 2009 Edition

The topic for the August 2009 edition of the GYR Carnival is Favorite Photo. Choose your favorite cemetery-related photo and bring it to the carnival. Post the photo to your blog, along with a short description of the photo, where it was taken, and why it’s your favorite.

Submissions for this edition are due July 25th. Please submit your article using the blog carnival submission form.

Upcoming Topics

• September – Carousel
• October – Funeral Cards
• November – Write Your Own Epitaph
• December – In the News

Looking for Topics for Next Year

Do you have a topic idea for the GYR Carnival? If so, please leave a comment on this post with your ideas for next year’s topics.

Graveyard Rabbits Carnival – July 2009

Welcome to the July 2009 edition of graveyard rabbits carnival. What a great edition we have this month! First, I want to thank the 15 authors who took the challenge and submitted such wonderful posts.

The topic for this edition is Obituaries. Participants were asked to find a gravestone and then find the obituary, or vice versa. There are 16 great posts that share not only wonderful gravestone photos, but a glimpse into the person’s life through their obituary. Some will make you smile and some will make you shed a tear, so grab a piece of Kleenex before you start reading.

Randy Seaver presents David Auble (1817-1894) - Gravestone and Obituary posted at Genea-Musings, saying, "David Auble (1817-1894) lies in a Terre Hauite cemetery resting under a nice stone, and his obituary identifies his living relatives and where they lived. Cool!"

Dorene Paul presents Harry Milner Steen posted at Graveyard Rabbit of Sandusky Bay, saying, "The newspaper obituary, and the ‘card of thanks’ from the Steen and Milner families, give insight into what a special little boy Harry Milner Steen was to his family, and how much they dearly loved him."

Joshua Inayat presents July 09 GYR Challenge: Find a Marker & The Obit posted at Cemetery Seeker. Joshua shares with us the tombstone and obituary for James Terwilliger of Portland, Oregon.

Midge Frazel presents George O. MINER Obituary posted at Granite in My Blood, saying, "Farmer and businessman, George O. Miner, was married to my great-grandaunt, 117 years ago today! I photographed their gravestones in 2004 but didn't receive this obituary until 2007. It is another piece of confirming evidence in this interesting ancestral line."

Jean Duncan presents Tombstone Tuesday: Stella and Bill Buzzell posted at Forget Me Knots: My Ancestors and My Ghosts, saying, "Enjoyed doing this, even though I'm not an official Graveyard Rabbit (but I would like to be one)." Editior’s Note: No need to be a GYR to submit to the Carnival, but Jean, we’d love to have you!

Sue Fitzpatrick presents Charlotte Cunningham Finkel (1912-1996) posted at Madronia Cemetery Graveyard Rabbit, saying, "Here's an older entry - but will be on the lookout for more obits."

Amy Crooks presents Tombstone Tuesday - Greiff Couple posted at Untangled Family Roots, saying, "I chose to find the obituary of a couple buried at the Wild Rose Cemetery. Though I was never able to find his, I did find hers. Their family still lives on the family farm and has created a museum in their honor out of one of the big red barns on the property."

Diane Wright presents Annie. E. Wright for July Carnival posted at The Grave Yard Rabbit Travels Wright.

Henk van Kampen presents An obituary posted at Roots, saying, "An obituary of Theo Pardoen by the NCGOV, the protestant association of the Dutch temperance movement."

Stephanie Lincecum presents Champion Pig Club Member is Dead posted at Southern Graves, saying, "William Wesley Middlebrooks, Champion Pig Club Member, dead at the age of 14."

Lisa Burks presents Mortician, Bury Thyself posted at Adventures in Grave Hunting by Lisa Burks, saying, "While researching the history of Grand View Memorial Park in Glendale, California, for an upcoming local history book about the cemetery, I discovered that a majority of the local mortuary founders were buried or interred there. My entry is a short blog post about William W. Crippen. I discovered his crypt first, then looked up his obituary."

Linda Hughes Hiser presents Graveyard Rabbits Carnival--Alpheus Frum posted at Flipside, saying, "Alpheus Frum lived, died, and is buried on family land outside Morgantown, West Virginia."

Linda Stienstra presents Headstone>Obituary>Obituary>No Headstone posted at Lancaster Pennsylvania's Graveyard Rabbit, saying, "One headstone led to one obituary, which led to another obituary, which led to the spot where a headstone should be. Hartman to Hartman, 200 feet apart! Were they related? Not that I could figure out! Read the story…."

Judith Richards Shubert presents JOHN KENDRICK CONVERSE – Necrological Report posted at Cemeteries of the Covered Bridges, saying, "Visiting Burlington, Vermont, in 2001, I found this beautiful monument to the Rev. John Kendrick Converse in the Lakeview Cemetery. His obituary is included with others in this Necrology Report from Princeton Theological Seminary in 1881."

Julie Cahill Tarr presents two submissions, one for each of her GYR blogs. The first, Hester Vernon BROWN Fell (1819-1906) posted at Cemeteries of Bloomington-Normal, Illinois looks at the life of Hester Fell, wife of Normal pioneer, Jess W. Fell. The second submission, Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) posted at Chicagoland Cemeteries talks about the death of Lincoln and the funeral train that passed through Chicago on the way to its final destination of Springfield, Illinois.

That concludes this edition. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page. Be sure to join us for our next edition, where the topic will be Favorite Photo.

New Article In The GYRabbit Online Journal

MOURNING VISITING CARDS

Often when researching, I am taken completely by surprise when a simple "nothing extraordinary" photograph or piece of ephemera, turns out to be anything but simple. When research starts it often takes on a life of its own and literally explodes.

So it was with a group of visiting cards I purchased. The group was of fifty plain, name only, no decoration, visiting cards, early 1900s. I purchased them because the lot description said there were two cards with black borders. I hoped these were mourning cards, but the seller didn't know and was just getting rid of some paper ephemera he had purchased at an estate sale. I purchased them, hoping they'd be what I was looking for.

The History Hare takes a look at Mourning Visiting Cards
You'll find the rest of this article in
the Graveyard Rabbit Online Journal.

Spread the Word – Part 6: The Real World

Up to this point, this article series discussed many “spread the word” opportunities in the digital world.  This final article will give you ideas for sharing information about your blog and the Association in the real word.

Many opportunities abound in our own communities, especially if our blog focuses on a particular geographic area.  Everyone has different strengths, so I will provide a variety of things you can do to “spread the word” in your community (or that of your blog’s focus).

View of Old Parish Cemetery (Bridgewater, MA), courtesy of Midge Frazel, used with permission.

Write an Article

Certainly we can all write a good article—just look at our blogs.  So take a moment to think of the outlets that would be interested in an article about the Association and/or your blog.  You could write an article for a local or state genealogical or historical society journal or newsletter.  You could contact a local newspaper to see if you could write an article for them (or be interviewed for an article written by their staff).  Even consider a local cemetery preservation group that has a newsletter.  Have a local Daughters or Sons of the American Revolution chapter, or other relevant association chapters?  See if they would be interested in running an article in their newsletter.

Give a Presentation

Again, think about the outlets that would be interested in a presentation about the Association and/or your blog.  These would likely be the same as those mentioned above, with the exception of the newspaper.  Contact these groups to see if they’d like to have you give a presentation.  If you do give a presentation, consider having a short handout that gives them information about the Association, including what we’re about, a link to the anchor blog, and how they can join.  And be sure to include a link to your blog.

Get Involved

Contact local cemeteries and let them know what you are doing.  Some of them may be so interested that they might provide you with lots of great information to share on your blog.  Others may want to involve you in projects they have (or would like to have) such as transcribing records, preservation projects, or photographing tombstones.  Likewise, local genealogical and historical societies may be working on projects that you could get involved with.

Contact a Library

Many libraries, especially genealogical, historical, and public libraries with a genealogy and/or history section, love to put out information relevant to the patrons.  Contact the librarian and see if they’d be willing to put out an information sheet about the Association.  If they are, then create a short piece, similar to the handout mentioned in “Give a Presentation” above.

Recruit a Rabbit

Consider getting other cemetery enthusiasts in your area involved.  Maybe they’d like to become a member.  Perhaps they don’t have the time to maintain a blog, but maybe they’d be willing to write an occasional article for your blog.

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Are there other ways the you’ve been “spreading the word” about the Association or your blog?  We’d love to hear about them!  Please leave a comment and let us know what you’ve been up to.

Reminder: GYR Carnival Submissions Due 6/25

Don’t forget, submissions for the July 2009 edition of the GYR carnival are due on June 25th.

The “challenge” for the July 2009 edition of the GYR Carnival is obituaries.  That’s right!  This one is going to be a challenge of sorts.  The “rules” are quite simple:  Find a grave, then find the obituary, or vice versa.  Post your finds to your blog and submit it to the carnival.

Submissions for this edition are due June 25th.  Please submit your article using the blog carnival submission form, and be sure to include a brief description in the remarks field.

New Article Available in the GYR Online Journal

This week, Stephanie Lincecum tells us how to survey a cemetery in her Graveyard Guru column.

I’ve been asked this question more than once, so I decided to tackle it in this edition of the Graveyard Guru. The expert I turned to when I first starting surveying cemeteries is the same one I look to with such matters to this day, Sharon DeBartolo Carmack (www.sharoncarmack.com).

Be sure to read How Do I Survey a Cemetery? to learn more.