Watching over me

Wildmead Cemetery

I am learning to use Photoshop Elements 8. And in doing so how to add textures to my photos. I am loving it and how it can transform a photo. You can see more on my photo blog Digital Photo Walk.

Blogger Dynamic Views

Blogger is offering 5 dynamic views for our blogs:

• Mosaic  
• Flipcard  
• Timeslide  
• Sidebar  
• Snapshot

If you have the correct settings you can see your blog in 5 new views by adding the word view to the end of your url. Example: digitalcemeterywalk.blogspot.com/view

I looked at mine and while they are new and pretty, they don't include any of my sidebar items. There is a note in one post that advertising and other options will be added in the future.

Try it out on your blog and let me know what you think. Sidebar and Snapshot were the two I liked the best.

Learn more here:

• Link 1
• Link 2  
• Link 3

EDIT:

I thought I'd show you 2 screen captures of this blog in Sidebar and Snapshot. Once you add the word view to the end of your url the new view will have a drop down menu [top right] where you can change and see all 5 views.

Other additions:

"...soon be able to customize and use for your blog..." is what the announcement said. So some people may want to change the overall appearance and layout of their blog. I guess it really depends on what you blog about and how it would be viewed in the new option.

Here is my wish list for Blogger:

Enable us to move all blogs under one sign-in / dashboard. I have 4 blogs - 2 on each sign-in / email.

Able to separate the blogs we follow, somehow. I have a genealogy / cemetery blog and follow blogs like that. I have a photo blog and follow blogs like it as well. My dashboard jumbles them all together.

Asking too much?

Oak Leaf Symbolism



Friendship Cemetery


Fred E. Sillin
Dec 30,1884
Sep 8, 1905

Oak leaves can symbolize many things, including: strength, endurance, eternity, honor, liberty, hospitality, faith and virtue. [Stories in Stone. A Field Guide to Cemetery Symbolism and Iconography. By Douglas Keister]

Mary's Autograph Book - Part 3

While researching Mary's brother, Samuel, I found a school teacher listing for Mary A. Hill for the years 1884-1886 and believed this was my Mary. One of the pages in the autograph book says "dear teacher" and dated 1883. She married in 1887 and no listing is found under her married name so perhaps she settled down to be a farmer's wife.

In the 1885 state census her brother Samuel was listed as a teacher. Taking a second look at that census I now see the ditto ["] marks under his occupation that would also be for his sister, Mary below.

I was tickled with this discovery!

[School records are 1884 to 1966]

When Cemetery Walks Cross in History

Last week I was in Texas visiting family and took a cemetery walk at the Lonesome Dove Cemetery. One of the stones stated the woman was a survivor of the Ft. Parker Massacre. Reading the Wikipedia page on the event I was surprised to find it was about Cynthia Ann Parker's capture and life spent with the Comanche Indians, marrying a chief, Peta Nocona, and giving birth to Quanah Parker, who would become the last chief of the Comanche Indians.

Buffalo Pitts Rollers

Wonder if any were actually used in a cemetery?

The Modern Cemetery
March 1914

Wordless Wednesday

Medlin Cemetery

Mary's Autograph Book - Part 2

I found a few treasures inside the autograph book last night. I can't wait to share them with you in a future post.

I wish Mary Hill was my ancestor. What a treasure this little book is. It saddens me that it found its way to an antique store. Most likely the result of an estate sale clean-out. [Just an assumption]

Today I am sharing an outline of her family and census abstracts. I love being able to fill in all the years available with the Kansas federal and state census. Census are one of my favorite research tools for genealogy. Snapshots in time.

Mary's Autograph Book - Part 1

I generally research a person and then share it here. This time I will take you along with me. I've peeked ahead and have some great finds...But wait...Let's start here:

Recently I discovered this autograph book from the early 1880's. I came upon it in a local antique store and it beckoned me to open it. Mary Hill. This is the name on the first page. Flipping through the pages I see them addressed to Mary or Mollie. So, it belonged to Mary "Mollie" Hill.

Mocavo

While I was out of town a new genealogy search engine launched...

About Mocavo

The world’s largest free genealogy search engine, Mocavo.com, provides genealogists access to the best free genealogy content on the web including billions of names, dates and places worldwide. Mocavo.com seeks to index and make searchable all of the world’s free genealogy information. While Mocavo.com discovers new sites every day, some of the existing sites searchable on Mocavo.com include genealogy message boards, family trees, state and local historical societies, the Library of Congress, National Archives, Ellis Island, Find A Grave, the Internet Archive, various U.S. state archives, and many tens of thousands of genealogy sites built by individuals. Similar to other search engines, Mocavo.com honors site owners by linking directly to their content.

I searched for my blog and it didn't come up, but a link from the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery to my blog did. Perhaps it will get indexed soon. The search results happen fast.

 
I searched for my name and had 525 results. I didn't check all of them but those I did were for me on websites that I manage or posts and messages from days gone by. Other results:
 
Cemetery symbolism - 317
Kansas cemeteries - 1,725
Cemetery blog - 3,040
 
It will be interesting to see search results in the days ahead. Dick Eastman and Randy Seaver have reviews linked from the home page. Stop by and see how it can help you.

Read ABOUT Macavo on its blog.

Password?

I felt like I was supposed to know the secret password to visit Stony Cemetery. The lane was blocked by cattle. They finally moo-ved. Hee hee!

I got a chance to take a few cemetery walks while visiting family in Texas earlier this week.

Denton Co.
Stony
Medlin

Tarrant Co.
Whites Chapel
Lonesome Dove

Welcome!

Welcome to my new blog followers. I hope you'll stop by often and take a cemetery walk with me.

Dust off the Cemetery Kit / Cart

Spring is in the air. At least today. A little cooler next week, but it will be here to stay soon. Right? I need to get my cemetery kit back in order. During the winter months I removed it from my SUV and so I need to get better organized. I showed you my cart back in 2009.

We Interrupt This Blog

Today I've:

• screamed for joy
• felt like fainting
• prayed I wasn't dreaming

And lifted a prayer of thanks...for Clay's continued protection and safe return home...soon.

A date. I finally have a date! Subject to change, but a date! He is scheduled to leave Afghanistan April 25th, arriving back in the states about 5 days later. This has been a long journey. I have managed to endure because of my faith, family and friends.

I was so excited I just had to share...with everyone!


PFC Rodney Clayton Wall
101st Airborne



Researching a Photographer

Marion William Bailey - Part 1

Today I am interviewing the 80 year old grandson of an early day Hutchinson photographer, Marion W. Bailey. I have been researching Bailey for someone writing a book on a large collection of his photos.

It will be nice to finally see a photo of the photographer!

I research many people [along with cemeteries] but have never had a project include two of my favorite hobbies...photography and cemeteries [genealogy].

More to come...

Bean Cemetery
Rice Co., KS

2011 Family Tree Magazine 40 Best Genealogy Blogs

Woo hoo! I made the list. Thank you to everyone that voted for me and for stopping by to take a cemetery walk with me.

You can read all about it HERE!


Edit:
At the time of the vote I was also the managing editor of the Graveyard Rabbits Online Journal. I recently retired from that position.

A snipped portion of the announcement.

Stories in Stone Traveling Exhibition

More about the Stories in Stone Traveling Exhibition by Douglas Keister. You can read my blog interview with Doug HERE.

Thanks to Lisa & John at The Passion Projects for providing this information.

A traveling exhibition based on Doug Keister’s highly acclaimed book, “Stories in Stone,” is available to all qualifying organizations on a month-by-month basis for the shipping cost and a modest exhibition fee.

As the leading authority on cemetery symbolism and iconography, Doug’s exhibition will guide your visitors through the significance of the language of cemetery symbols, which were designed to speak to future generations about the deceased bearer of same. In a very real sense, memorials erected to the dead are the material representatives of those now departed, and we often draw our impressions of what these persons must have been like from the things we find upon them. They say that cemeteries may exist more for the living than the dead. Only to a point. Whatever one may think about cemeteries, we, as well as they, want to be remembered. Doug teaches us to do that.

Doug’s recent appearance on “CBS Sunday Morning with Charles Osgood” program, speaks to the esteem rendered upon this most talented, knowledgeable, preeminent authority on the subject of cemetery symbolism. Douglas Keister has given his Stories in Stone presentations in dozens of cities all over America and at prestigious locations like the Cooper-Union in New York City, Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, and The Smithsonian in Washington DC.

The self-contained exhibition comes complete with 2 double-sided screens and 1 kiosk styled screen; 3 display racks (others available) and 1 introductory display panel. Display materials include: 1 Introductory roll-up panel, 43 13x19 panels with velcro, 10 20x24 panels with velcro. Lights do not come with exhibit, but may be suitable for darker location.

For more information:

The Passion Projects
Lisa Griffiths-Lewis – lisa@victorianalady.com
John Thomas Grant – jtgrant19@gmail.com
http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Passion-Projects/133921303297945?ref=ts

Cemetery Art Video

I haven't done much genealogy research lately. And that means I haven't checked for changes over at FamilySearch.org either. We usually give periodic updates at our genealogical society meetings. Wow! Was I in for a surprise when I visited the site recently.

I haven't navigated through it all yet but I can tell it is much more organized and user friendly.

Starting with the front page---click on the "What's New?" button and follow the updates.

And at the bottom of the home page---check out the free learning courses.

Once you get there you could spend many hours learning so much with some great resources....all at your finger tips.

Scanning down through the list I see there is a video on Cemetery Art by the Midwest Genealogy Center which is part of the Mid-Continent Library. I didn't get to watch all of it but I do plan to go back and finish it.

You can also get Slides from the video in PDF.

This reminds me of a pending project I haven't finished....short videos on the cemeteries in my county. Maybe I'll start over on one and use my new camera that also does video and see how it turns out.

Here is something interesting---I am working on a very detailed project for this cemetery. All of the work is shared with the city and sexton. This document would be interesting to look at and pass on to a fellow researcher that is documenting all of the civil war soldiers.

I can see where I will be spending some time in the near future. Stop by and check it out too. You just may discover something new.

Blog Interview with Douglas Keister

Photographer-writer Douglas Keister has authored and co-authored thirty-eight critically acclaimed books. He also writes and illustrates magazine articles and contributes photographs and essays to dozens of magazines, newspapers, books, calendars, posters and greeting cards worldwide.

Most of us, cemetery bloggers, know of him for his cemetery books: [1] Going Out In Style, [2] Stories in Stone, [3] Forever Dixie and [4]Forever L. A. His 5th cemetery book, Forever New York, will be published in the Fall. I hope he will continue to author cemetery books because they fill a void for those of us that love the beauty and historical aspect of a cemetery.

Doug was very kind to agree to this informal blog interview. Let’s learn a little more about him.