What started out as a simple show and tell has grown into a full blown "hobby". Not sure if that term really fits. But a lot of my time for the last 6 months has been spent doing it. What is "it" you say. Well photographing headstones in all the local cemeteries of course. Over 14,000 and counting. Not just taking a picture, but uploading it to the website
Find A. Grave .com to a memorial someone has already created or creating a memorial from the inscription on the stone. The count on my created memorials is near 2,500.
This pass-time has grown from me photographing my parent's headstone to share with my siblings. I wanted to show that the date of death had been added a while after the funeral. So from there I found the Find A Grave website and away I went. There is a whole community of people doing this. Many like me closer to our death than birth. Some of the "old timers" in this group have well over 100,000 memorials created. In fact there is competitive spirit among some of the contributors to add the newest burial in a cemetery before anyone else does. I personally enjoy seeing the percent photographed for a nearby cemetery rise to near 100%. Knowing that any relative searching for a person can find a memorial and a picture of their loved-one's headstone.
This is something you can do away from home as well. As my recent side trips to cemeteries in Michigan have shown.
This pass-time has grown from me photographing my parent's headstone to share with my siblings. I wanted to show that the date of death had been added a while after the funeral. So from there I found the Find A Grave website and away I went. There is a whole community of people doing this. Many like me closer to our death than birth. Some of the "old timers" in this group have well over 100,000 memorials created. In fact there is competitive spirit among some of the contributors to add the newest burial in a cemetery before anyone else does. I personally enjoy seeing the percent photographed for a nearby cemetery rise to near 100%. Knowing that any relative searching for a person can find a memorial and a picture of their loved-one's headstone.
This is something you can do away from home as well. As my recent side trips to cemeteries in Michigan have shown.
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