The Truth About FindAGrave
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- Опубліковано 22 тра 2024
- FindAGrave can be a great resource for genealogy, or it can completely mess up your family tree. Here's what you need to know about how FindAGrave actually works.
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There are mistakes with my family, and it's tough (sometimes impossible) to get the person who submitted the erroneous information to correct it. Take every single memorial with a grain of salt and do further research-- especially if there is no picture of the stone AND especially if there is no gravestone at all.
Same here. In one case, they had a grave stone with three names on it, which they listed as Father, Mother, and Son. But I knew that they were in fact three of my father's siblings who all died relatively young and somewhat around the same time.
Absolutely. I try to submit corrections when I find errors but the process isn't great and I have no idea if any corrections actually get made.
If you submit a request for a correction, you should get an email when it has been approved (or rejected). I'd done this several times and, with my documentation supporting the reason for correction, they have always been approved. Also, as Amy points out, many of these memorials are added by volunteers who will gladly give up ownership of a memorial to a family member. Just make that request.
Trouble with that in the UK not everyone was rich enough to have a grave stone. They got papers Graves. However, if you have the burial record it gives you the grave site, date they were interred.
I submit corrections all the time. If they are accepted you get an email.
I couldn't agree more. A few years back, I was researching my fathers family, and came across a memorial for what appeared to be one of my aunts. All of the related information seemed to match her life events. So, of course I picked up the phone and called her to see how she was doing. The usual, she was cooking dinner for some of her grandkids that evening.
I’ve run into similar problems. Same name, same year of birth in the same city but a different spouse with different kids. It pays to look for details in the census.
I have a suspicion you ran into another serious problem with that website. People would upload "FUTURE" grave sites based on markers already there.
People often add the names that appear on headstones that are actually for living persons. Ran into that with a distant cousin of mine. Her husband had passed; her name and birth year were on the headstone. On the good side, I was able to connect that memorial to the ones of her parents.
@@Gancanna My GF was born in 1975. When she was about 6 months she lost her parents in an auto accident near Dayton Ohio. Now of course both of her parents have memorials on that website. The problem is my GFs mother was not her father's first wife. That lady is still alive and living these days in Colorado. In the Dayton Cemetary where her parents are buried, they have a headstone with his name on one side and the 1st wife's name on the other, my GFs mom is on the other side of him with her own marker. About 10 years ago someone created a memorial to the still-living ex-wife. Somehow that memorial found its way into the Ancestry website. My GF is her dad's only child. The first marriage was childless. In the memorial, no mention was made that the lady was still alive. There was almost a life insurance payout to a brother that only got stopped because a claims adjuster did some checking. It took a long time, but that website finally just removed that memorial.
I have no issue with a person that is still living having a memorial. The issues come about because the "gravers" are not doing due diligence to make sure the person actually has a published Obit to verify they are gone. If not say so in the memorial. If I was graving, I rather have 100 well-written and documented memorials that have accurate information than 1000 that are sloppily done that most likely have a lot of mistakes. This is part of the problem with that website. As I said, the man that started that website was a grifter that used the labor of others to build a database and he sit back and got paid for ads. What I really loved was how he would allow someone to "sponsor" a memorial for 5 bucks and take the ads away. A while back before the sale I wanted to go check out a memorial from back in my hometown to a man lost in the middle east. While searching I came across another memorial I know for a fact had been sponsored. I saw ads. Did JT give a refund?
So as you can see I am not a big fan of that site before the sale and to be honest now. No serious Genealogist will use any information found on it without a lot of research to confirm the information is right!
@@THE-michaelmyers For reasons like the ones you gave about people not doing their due diligence, I always send some kind of source(s) to back up my suggested edits to memorial managers. I tend to use the info posted on Find A Grave as clues to other records rather than as official documentation.
I have been a contributor to Find a Grave for a number of years. My big complaint would be about those who have tens of thousands of entries. They do this to rack up numbers. They don’t want to make corrections or add any thing new. I always try to work with the people who want grandmother’s page or make additions or corrections. I have a little over 3000 pages. They are mostly in the cemetery in my husband’s hometown. This was my mental therapy to get our of the house when visiting my husband’s mother. It saved my sanity. On my own family I love leaving my research to those kin to me that are yet to come. A long time ago when company came to visit they would always go to the local photographer and get photos made of each family (one copy) and exchange them. By posting them on Find A Grave is a wonderful way to share these photos with others who might never know what their ancestor looked like.
your first 4 sentences are spot on!!!!
I’ve been on my quest for my paternal/paternal side of family for a very long time now(over 25 yrs) with no luck. The only thing I know about him is his first/last name and the Country he originated from. Your videos have introduced me to new ways of searching. I’m 60 yrs old and there have been times I’ve given up but find myself searching again. 😢. Thank you
I'm so glad that my videos have been helpful! Keep up the search!
Don't give up Esther !
Useful information! I've found that even close family members (siblings) have entered incorrect information; so, always, verify with other sources.
I get angry with find a grave as people are creating memorials and they do not know where the person is buried. Someone created a memorial for my 6th great-grandfather who died in June 1776 during the American Revolution and guessed he was buried in a specific cemetery in Somerset County, NJ, which there is no proof.
Did you submit a correction?
Since it’s often difficult to track the daughters of a family if you don’t know their married name, I check the cemetery where their parents are buried and research everyone with the daughter’s first name and approximate birthdate. Admittedly, this works much better in small cemeteries but sometimes I hit the jackpot and find the missing daughter that way.
The fact you talked about in regards to % of memorials photographed was very eye opening for me! I did not know that and in the past, I've dismissed a potential cemetery as being a burial site for an ancestor. So, I actually feel much more optimistic about finding my ancestors. THANK YOU!
Yeah, I had an entire cemetery of my dad's people that has about 20 people in it that didn't exist on FaG. I had to create the cemetery with all the info (name, location, GPS, cross streets, etc.) and then add each person and transcribe their stones one by one. It took about a day to go out and snap the photos and then get on the keyboard but once it's done, it's done and there for future generations.
I've gone to Find A Grave and located all my family here where I live. It was just information - no memorial. I sent a request to the person who had entered that info and asked that it be transferred to me since I'm family. All of them were transferred with no problems. The info listed was correct, but lacking some which I was able to then add. For those whose info isn't, maybe request that record be released to you so you can correct it.
you were lucky
I have had fairly good luck getting corrections made. Unfortunately, whoever has my father's memorial hasn't made the submitted corrections. Perhaps I will ask to have it transferred to me.
I discovered Find A Grave about 20 years ago on a Sunday when Catholic cemetery offices are closed. My son and I were visiting hometown Chicago. We were heading back to Ohio, but we always did something interesting on the final day in Chicago. My son suggested finding Al Capone's grave. My son knew the cemetery that he was buried in. We arrived and I said I'll have to Google his grave. That's when one of the results came from Find A Grave. We found it. Later, I did a Find A Grave search for a sister whom I never knew. She was born about 16 months after me, but only lived one day. How grateful I was too find out where she was buried. She's in a pauper's cemetery near Chicago. Someone had taken the time to research the cemetery records and post them to Find A Grave.
Just FYI: Al Capone has two graves. His original grave is at Mt. Olivet in Chicago, while his newer grave of where actually currently resides is at Mount Carmel Cemetery in Hillside. Right across from Capone's grave in Mount Carmel is his right hand man, Frank Nitti. Cool cemetery! Also there is Dennis Farina, Sam Giancana, Hymie Weis, Dean O'Brien, Vincenzo Gibaldi (Jack McGurn), as well as other notables
@@patricklynch6771 I didn't know that.
One of the things I do for my family trees is make the connections between children and their parents in the Find a Grave records.
Great stuff, Amy ... it's all so true 👍
I hadn't considered that the percentage of memorials that were photographed in a cemetery were only Find A Grave memorials. Kind of a game changer ... lol
Thank you!
Thank you! :-)
As a findagrave user and contributor, I didn't know this either!
@@AmyJohnsonCrow I've been on FG for over 17 years and never realized the percentage was for memorials *photographed*.
agree - that was super useful information.
I know they had big families way back when, but when I see folks on findagrave with 25 kids over the course of 50 years I really get leary!
Well, GOD din't give EVERYONE those big families.
No shock there........
My grandmother had fifteen children as well as two sets of stillborn twins and one stillborn child only stopping when grandad died age forty!
Thank you for these tips. I’m tired of friends saying FindAGrave doesn’t have it, it’s only as good as what we have added.
Yes! Not finding something on FindAGrave doesn't mean that the information doesn't exist somewhere else!
I have experience on Find-A-Grave both as a researcher and poster and i can tell you this tutorial is Excellent. Amy covers the how=to and pitfalls perfectly.
My pet peeve is inactive and unresponsive managers. Most of the work I do is adding and correcting info, and linking profiles. I'm always amazed by the number of suggestions that are auto-accepted after 21 days. No review, no participation. They are managers by courtesy only. Also happens that I might suspect a manager is deceased but they use a handle, so there's no way to find out, and Findagrave will take no action to release their profiles without proof.
If a manager is unresponsive after 30 days - send a message to find a grave and see if the memorial can be transferred to you for updating. I have been on the system for 16+ years and find the ones that are unresponsive do not either deserve to be memorial managers. or maybe have non-family memorials. I have often recommended to people who are members with memorials to turn on all notifications and never close down communications.
@@kilandrayeuxdoux2804 Yes, that works for messages, but it doesnn't work for simple change suggestions. Those are auto-accepted after 21 days. In practical terms, it's a loophole. The manager doesn't respond in 21 days so Findagrave "helps them" avoid being unresponsive after 30 days.
As someone who contributes to Find-A-Grave, I usually have a process about contributing to the site.
1. If they have a memorial and do not have a photograph of their grave, I take a photograph of said grave (making sure landmarks are visible) and upload it to the website; double-checking to see if all information is verifiable.
2. If they do not have a find-a-grave, but have a headstone, I will put all information available on the headstone (using that as a source basis), and use that for the memorial.
3. If there is a discrepancy with the memorial (I.e. the location, DoD, etc), I will message the person who created it or suggest edits to the memorial in order to produce the best information possible.
My expertise is in photographing and uploading grave markers for Soldiers of the American Civil War. I will then work with other contributors who have access to the muster rolls for particular soldiers and allow for them to do any appropriate edits to the memorial (the Muster Rolls provide all the information about their service record, injuries, leaves of absence, etc).
If those pieces of information are lacking, I always go with what the headstone says first and record what they say (they usually are reliable, especially if no accurate DoD is available on any documents).
Thank you, Amy, for bringing up so many valuable points. I am new to Find a Grave, both as a researcher and a volunteer. I have found every point you mentioned to be spot on. Find a Grave, growing from a celebrity grave site to a place where we may find family graves, photos, and family connections is still a work in progress, carried on by folks who not only would like to find their own families, but have a heart to help others find theirs. I sometimes find headstones missing a death date - that of the person who was once the surviving spouse. Some cemeteries have been known by different names, also (Maple Hill or Pike Cemetery, Higgins Hill or Bates Cemetery, in NY State), so searching a surname in the county and surrounding counties has really been helpful, especially where county boundaries have changed. I love this site and have been just thrilled at what I've discovered on it. I say be grateful for the clues and do your homework ❤
Yes, Find A Grave is self policing. Not always can you get the memorial manager to make a correction, or add information. Occasionally there will be information that helps me break through a dead end. I've engaged with great memorial managers, and very nasty memorial managers. Roll the dice...
I found out to be the case I waited about two months for the managers of my great uncle's grave to connect it to my great grandparents
I waited over a month for the manager to transfer to myself my parents and my brother..I finally had to seek the help from FAG and they transferred the info..this person also has other close family my grandparents and grandparents…
Those nasty ones are just “body counters”
Just recently I've started to add 'Suggested edits' to the individual to help future users searching for family members. I only ever add information which is available from a core record like a baptism or death registration. My edits have all been accepted by FindaGrave volunteers and I always provide additional text to prove the information. I don't know how often people use this 'Suggestions' facility but it's a good idea.
I learned from my job working with the public that there are individuals who break the "rules" when it comes to names and date of births as well. Two different people can have the exact same name AND the exact same date of birth and yet they are not related. I have found that people of the same names can live in the same area, but not exactly in the same time period, but close. I had someone on my ancestry who had the same name, same city of residence, and even the same name of her husband, but their date of death was off by decades! Like they say, "truth is stranger than fiction." It is often many fine details that can reveal you have the wrong person. It becomes harder and harder the further back you go. Many graves have no marker or had others buried on top of them.
Many good points in this video…my great-grandmother’s entire family in Ireland is buried in the same cemetery “Omey Island cemetery.” I’m planning on visiting this cemetery VERY SOON because unfortunately being on an island, there are often high tides that bring salt water to the stones. I’ve heard someone say all of the Celtic Crosses by the water are completely erased of any inscriptions which is just heartbreaking.
With any luck, at least some of the inscriptions have been covered by compacted earth for a long enough time to protect them. The exposed headstones in a cemetery I was researching on California's north coast were difficult or impossible to read, but when I cleared the dirt away from some of them the carving that had been covered up was much more legible.
I was just recently looking for the death date of one of my grandmothers aunts. I thought she died in Michigan but couldn’t find any information. I looked for her children on findagrave in Indiana. Then I looked for her in the cemeteries they were buried in. She had a different last name but I found her in an Indiana cemetery and the findagrave memorial had her death date. I haven’t been able to locate her death certificate yet but I feel like I’m one step closer.
Where at in Indiana?
Liking the new background, Amy! I make sure when someone asks for an edit for the ones I manage, I always do the research to make sure it's correct.
Thanks! I've been wanting to spruce up that side of the background for a long time! Have you seen that the new FindAGrave edit form will let you add notes to your suggested edits? That can be a game changer for getting manager to approve suggestions.
No I didn’t but will look tonight. Thanks for bringing that up!!
Great video! I love FindAGrave and can get lost in it (or any research!) for hours.
Personal lessons from FindAGrave and my family tree:
1 - Not all gravestones are accurate. My own grandfather has 2 stones, in 2 different states! When my grandmother died, Grandpa chose 2 plots with a joint gravestone, in their home state where they had grown up together. This stone has his birthdate but no death date - because he isn't buried there. After her death, he very quickly remarried (!) to a much younger woman, who decided he wouldn't be buried with his first wife. So his actual burial site is in my home state (where he and my grandmother actually spent much of their adult lives and retired), with a gravestone with complete dates. Don't assume the marker you see is correct. Make sure you check death certificates to see where someone was actually buried.
2 - Not all graves have markers. Old stone markers do deteriorate, crack, and break, sadly, and many have completely disappeared. But there are also "newer" graves with no markers. My father took me to a cemetery where much of his mother's family was buried, but we couldn't find his grandparents, who'd passed in the early 1930s. When I called the cemetery, yes, they are buried there, but there is no marker, and there may never have been one. FindAGrave does have memorials that recognize many of these folks who have no grave markers (or even no gravesite, due to other options for remains). Don't give up if you can't locate the exact gravesite: Check with the cemetery directly if you want to know the exact location of any specific grave.
3 - I agree with other comments here that it can be difficult or darned near impossible to get some people to correct an entry on FindAGrave or respond to a question - and it is frustrating to those of us who want the record set straight. But some contributors are amazingly generous. I contacted a FindAGrave contributor about my great-grandfather's ancestors. The gentleman turned out to have a lot of solidly documented research on our family, which he willingly shared with me. A few days later, I found an additional surprise on FindAGrave: He had transferred the management of my 4x great-grandfather to me. I had not asked for this. I was apparently the only person from my extended branch who had ever shown interest to this researcher, and he wanted someone who had a closer connection to that portion of the family to have management.
4 - FindAGrave is a great tool to point me in the right direction or confirm something I've located in other records. But I don't rely on what any one source states as gospel truth, whether it's FindAGrave, court records, death certificates, birth records, census, etc. All records can have errors due to the fact that they're based on someone reporting the "facts" as they know them. But the more sources you can gather that agree, the stronger the roots to support your family tree.
5 - Don't be surprised when you find yourself taking photos of total strangers' graves. LOL It is fun to look at FindAGrave before I visit a cemetery and see what photo requests other people have posted, then sharing my pics on the site. We're all sharing our discoveries with each other!
Great video with pertinent cautions! I use Find a Grave a lot. An occasional bonus is an obituary on the memorial page. When I have thoroughly researched my various family tree branches, I try to ensure they are connected on Find a Grave. I add a missing spouse with the year of marriage as well as missing parents. When the parents are added, I can find and link missing siblings. I also add maiden names, places of birth and death, and dates of birth and death. I have found many incorrect dates on tombstones. When I have a copy of a birth or death certificate, I make a correction. I have added pictures of relatives and copies of obituaries. I have found some duplicates for which I suggested merges. I also use Billion Graves and Irish Graveyards too. Thanks for sharing!
Great timing! I was trying to figure out how to explain all of this to my niece. You've done it for me!
Glad it was helpful!
I found a memorial for my 4x great grandmother which had other family attached, but no photos. The cemetery was an hour away so I did a little road trip. She nor any of my other relations linked to her were there. Someone put these memorials in but prefaced it with "assumed buried there". I had done research at the local library and church and she was not buried there. I don't think people should be able to put something on it based on their assumption only.
They should not. I would report that. Find-A-Garve will not give you a tansfer past the first great, or second great. I think it is second great, maybe third, as I tried to get one of those and they said they can’t trace back that far back.
I've come across this numerous times, or people just make a memorial with no grave location and just a date of death, that may or may not be correct
@@12234nic11234 Those people are getting it from either the obituary, which many people don’t have anymore, or gettng it from the mortuary website. The memorials are created as soon as it is documented there. Makes me SO mad!
I learned this as well and really had me messed up on my research till I understood that find a grave has some bad info. I made a logging and tried to submit changes but they haven't happened yet.
I was always taught that the best thing to do is”Go off of” is that Grave Stone Carvings usually don’t lie”
I have found, on many sites, that if you put in too much info, you may not get a result. It could be because the wrong date was entered, or a name has been entered incorrectly. With many older individuals, you may have a birth/death(or other) location that is not even known today. My grandfather was born, "On the Kansas, Oklahoma border" on many sources. While some will say Kansas, others will say Oklahoma, and another says "Indian territory".
Indian territory is Oklahoma. It’s simply the Pre-1890’s term for the region.
I use FindAGrave to find a grave only. It helps but is not definite.
And that's all it should ever be used for since that's its sole intent.
Also, if someone is listed as a parent it might not be accurate. Plenty of times I've seen a step parent listed as a child's birth parent.
You're exactly right! Not only does that happen on FindAGrave, but in people's trees, census records, even marriage records.
I have run across that problem too! I recognized the error right away, but others may not.
Makes me glad FTM has an option for step-parent.
my great grandmother on mom's side isn't buried in a cemetery. there is another grave near by..but the town cemetery is about 1/4th mile down the road. when any relatives come visit i show them her grave.
I'm just discovering all that find a grave has to offer and this is very helpful info. i found a memorial stone that listed several family members where they were born and died and their occupations. got me over a brick wall! thanks
Wow........
I had to climb over a brick wall to find a grave.
Gate was locked. 😂
@@fabianmckenna8197 rofl
Great information Amy, I knew some of it but you’ve told me some other things to try, thank you for all you do, very appreciated
You are so welcome!
Excellent tips! Your library science skills are well used here. I will be using this video with my local family history group! Thank you
I feel sad for the people trying to reach silent managers. I’ve been a volunteer photographer now for almost 16 years, and if I come across a memorial where some info is missing or incorrect (I’m going by the tombstone) and I suggest an edit, it’s answered 99.9% of the time the same day.
While I can’t say I’m that good, edits to me go no longer than a few days.
All I can say with FaG’s new rules, it’s easier for family members to get control of family memorials. So keep trying and get your family back from these absentee managers.
Don't forget, some family members can also become absent, as well. It usually happens when people who are new to the site find a few relatives who are buried there; get all excited about creating their family trees (that seems to be their main focus) and placing them in virtual cemeteries. They start making multiple transfer requests from existing creators and managers who (in some cases) have walked the actual cemeteries and taken the headstone photographs, often years earlier.
But then after a few weeks or months, the novelty has worn off for them; and they have abandoned the site. In many cases, it's not that they had extensive biographical information, photographs, or other customization to add. Most can't even be bothered to add a single virtual flower-they just want to "own" the memorial because it's their father's 7th cousin four times removed (or whatever). :\ I know of one graver in my local area who had well over a hundred thousand memorials and claimed to be related to most of them. 🙄
It used to be under FaG's old rules years ago that the relation had to be direct line ancestors (or descendants) in order to mandate transfers. While I always thought that was a bit restrictive (i.e., that left out spouses, siblings, uncles/aunts, etc. whom people might have actually known in life and shared significant relationships), now it's more of a free-for-all. Meanwhile, I can't even get my paternal great-grandfather's memorial transferred to me.
@@user-gy3vp3tm3s Go read the rules and submit the request properly. You have to do it exaclty as stated in the rules. When they either don’t transfer, or answer, send it in to F.A.G and they will work on it for you. I have gotten my Great’s with ease. Just make sure the manager isn’t closer related than you are, which they usually are not.
My Dad is buried in a family cemetery that is 1 acre in size and taken from a section of land his parents owned. The title to the cemetery was transferred back and forth a couple of times eventually the cemetery district took it over. Until that time it was weeds and no boundary or sign . When dad was buried there in 2013 we brought a sign for the cemetery. I also took many pictures of headstones markers with names. I was surprised to see names that are not family members. I found dad on findagrave and joined with the intention of uploading the pictures I took of the cemetary. I was unable to get access to dad's account to add information. I emailed the site and never got a response back.
Keep trying. Be persistent. I went to add my Dad after his burial. I've been a volunteer for Find a Grave for many years, but was surprised to find that someone else had taken ownership of _my_ Dad's grave! I have yet to attempt to claim ownership, due to more important things going on in my life taking priority over my volunteer activities for Find a Grave. But I encourage you to persist in claiming your family, if only to be a needle in the sides of the Find a Grave admins. Needles tend to encourage changes in posture.
Same thing with my mother's memorial. A stranger has control of it and it's incorrect. My brother contacted that person to get access to the memorial to correct it or to manage it, and they refused to respond. Do they profit somehow from that, because it seems to me that a "volunteer" would be eager to get the facts straight.
The short answer is no, there’s no profit in it for the volunteers, to my knowledge. I’ve been a a volunteer photographer for almost 16 years now.
The only guess I can make is that these “missing” managers have either passed away themselves or have gone on to other things.
As a volunteer I get quiet a few requests for images, and sometimes, as in this past week my inbox has been filled. So they’re either no longer able to read emails or are having them go into the junk file. And for the one going into junk - I say complain about that person loudly (but politely) and often.
Go and read the proper was to request transfer and do it that way. Make SURE you copy it to yourself (there a an icon) so when you get no reponse you can send it to F.A.G. READ THE RULES. Here is an example of what I say: (Hello, I am respectfully requesting that you transfer the memorial of my Father to me. My user ID is: 2323232 Thank you!) You do this one their page. Send to them and yourself.
My relative, Jacob Keener Wilhelm served in the civil war and on one "find a grave" site it says he's buried in the older part of the Holladay Cemetary. I went there and didnt find any grave of his there. I contacted a cousin who is into genealogy and she told me from her research he is buried in an "unmarked" grave next to some of his immediate family in a whole other cemetery in my hometown of Camden. I dont get a chance to go home for visiting very often. But finding his family members headstones in "Eastview Cemetary" will be on my "to do list" the next time i come home for a visit.
You made some excellent points. I had photographed a cemetery and assumed that a baby was the child of the couple it was buried by. Another volunteer did additional research and found that they weren't related despite the same surname.
Strange things happen.......
My wife's Scottish great aunt was married with two kids before giving birth to a third child with only the mothers name on the birth certificate.
Child died aged eight with informant being an unrelated carer in a city forty miles away.
Mother and husband remained married until their death.... Odd one but everyone connected with it is dead so no clues.
I would like to add..Don't assume that just because it says that a person is a child of someone, or a parent of someone that it is true, You still need to "prove" your lines using actual documentation. In one line for my husband's family, there is a person who for unknown reasons, has made up the parents based on absolutely no "proof " whatsover. People see it and copy it exactly and it just snow balls. I have tried to stop it...I send notes asking if they have any documents to "prove" the relationship and they don't.. but that they refuse to remove it from their trees. This person has even made up middle names for the people too! I don't understand why!! It makes me so frustrated !! I've been working on this tree for over 25 years and it makes me sad.
Same with me…there was no source at all claiming her parents to be who EVERYONE claimed they were. Ordered marriage certificate from England and it disproved everything by listing a different father’s name. From there I was able to find her siblings in newspaper articles and a sister’s death certificate in South Africa gave me the mother’s name. Case closed.
Edit: It’s also annoying when they make up birthdates by “subtracting 25.”
We had something similar happen with my husband's family. His dad had always thought that his grandfather was named Harvey. We went to the Indiana Archives. I started with his father (who's name we knew), and viola! there he was. Not Harvey, but Campbell Owen. I also found Campbell's father, who's name was unknown.
I have this same problem. My 3rd gr grandfather had a daughter named Amanda born in 1819. After he was widowed, he married a woman with a daughter named Amanda born in 1841. It appears that the 4 year old assumed his surname and people are treating the 2 Amanda’s as if they are the same person. Getting guardianship or adoption records has been nearly impossible so I haven’t been able to prove it.
I spent over 1 year with professionals adding several generations (both backwards and forwards) on my Danish lines. Sadly, someone disconnected all this from a public tree. So I have now created a private tree and have to go through all my paper notes to get tjrm back on my tree. The family went bavk to about 1500 when the state owned Lutheran church was requied to keep records!
Sadly, whoever unconnected them, never contacted me.
@@janetcarlson4923That's heartbreaking.
I was nodding my head up and down as I watched this video. This has been exactly my experience. Considering that there is no oversight applied to the volunteers who create memorials, it is frustrating that you feel like you are applying for a passport when trying to get things corrected. Usually small errors are happily corrected. However, it seems that the more 'research' a volunteer has put into a memorial, the less willing they are to respond well to correcting issues even if I provide all the documentation to back things up. This is usually related to connections that go beyond what is carved on the stones. Find-a-Grave itself was no help in resolving the most egregious issue I found in my own family. Good point you made about the percentage of photographing. I don't think I've every thought about it that way.
Love the new posters in the background Amy…I’m assuming those are your ancestors’ countries of origins. Great idea. I’ve recently started an “ancestor wall” so far I just have a photo from a NYC billboard of my great-grandfather and a photo of my great-great-grandfather and his sister but I’m going to Target to get new frames soon. Super thankful my grandmother collected photos and maintained a bunch of scrapbooks!!
Great tips! Thank you Amy Johnson Crow! I did not know about the photographs as representing the percentage of Findagrave memorials that had been photographed. You've piqued my curiosity about the Wildcards. I'm headed there next.
What I gather from this video, and my experience using the site, is that editing FindAGrave is easier than Wikipedia (due to how memorials and family trees are made and limited moderation), but often with little to no citation.
Very good analysis. I have used Find-a-Grave quite a lot and I can personally verify what you say. I enjoyed this video a lot and I subscribed.
As a long-time but currently inactive volunteer for Find a Grave, I can attest to this info. I'll also add the caution that there are concerns with contributors who claim ownership of a family entry and refuse to relinquish it, even when they are in no way related to the family they claim ownership of. This wouldn't be a concern if they didn't have the power to reject or remove edits from actual family members who have solid info. I'm not talking about vague memories that Great-Aunt Sarah has about her great-grandparents burial place. I'm talking about adult children who are directly involved in the burial of their parents, who go to add the memorial to Find a Grave, only to find that a complete stranger already added it, with incorrect information, took ownership of the memorial, and rejects out removes the edits submitted by the children. And the stranger doesn't have to give up control, by F a G terms of use. I don't know what the motivation is for the control freaks, but it's irksome to see one's own family genealogy being twisted and manipulated into fiction. It's sociopathic. I do hope F a G corrects this format, lest it become as reliable as Wikipedia, if you know what I mean.
Thank you! They do allow family to take the memorials within the first year, but to list them before they are even buried is a bit much. Happened to me with both of my parents. (They didn’t have that rule at their time of death. Find A Grave is not typically what I am concentrating on upon a death either) Then you have the picture takers that the manager has no control over. I have gotten F. a.G to remove some photos as well.
Look up Request-to-Manage For close relatives management must be transferred. Follow the process outlined, keep a copy of the request email (tick the box) in case you need to report non-response of manager to your request, and Find A Grave staff will transfer instead.
Thanks for doing this. There are very few UA-cam videos about FindAGrave and it can be very useful. 😊Often there are photos of the person and/or obituaries and death certificates attached to the memorial.
FaG has a YT channel but they rarely post to it which is a shame. They could give a lot of useful ideas and their policies on it for people to watch and learn.
Great video! Glad you explained about the percent because I didn't know that. Thank you.
Longtime volunteer here ( ID #24). MS kept me from being as active on the ground. A classmate got a box of obit clippings in an auction lot,, He dropped it on my doorstep during Covid... You can follow my progress uploading 1000+ clippings. Info comes from many places.
All excellent points! I use Findagrave as a jumping off point, but I rarely take only that as a source. I'm a little more likely to believe if there's a headstone photo, but again, most of the time it's already someone I know is the correct person. I try to fix anyone I find where I know they need attached and I always send my source to the 'manager of the profile' but I know most folks probably don't do that. I've been frustrated too by corrections I've sent that are never accepted-if you don't want to keep handling profiles, give them up!
I'm in a genealogy road trip right now. I am trying to sit down and update things like linking and accuracy (newly met cousin telling me if she thinks something is wrong).
Just found you and subscribed. I have had two instances of errors with family members. I was able to get the funeral director who added my father's information to correct a major omission in his listing of children. My brother predeceased my dad and was not included in his bio. My great-grandfather died in a hospital and someone assumed he was buried in that city. But his grave is actually with his family in the family plot in another city. The person who created the memorial graciously made the correction and included a photo that I sent her.
I had the ssme problem with my grandfather. My grsndparents moved a year or 2 before his death to be close to my aunt. But he had lived basically his entire life in a small farming community. So he was buried in his hometown. Eventually my aunt and uncle returned and they too are buried in the same cemetery. Yet to this day,, people ate still showing the wrong cemetery!
@@janetcarlson4923 I was lucky that when I contacted the person who was researching the hospital cemetery, they were happy to make the change. It did take weeks to hear back, though
Good info. I would also suggest that if people are interested they can ask to have the memorial transferred to their name. I did that with my moms site on find a grave.. It just felt weird to have an unknown person be in charge:) Also, depending on the time of death, there might not be a burial site. In more recent times, people are opting for cremation and no burial. I had looked for my estranged fathers grave site only to later discover that he had been cremated.
Yes Sheri, I find that a lot of people are scared to request transfers which is very disheartening. I was on findagrave without an account for years until my grandfather’s death, his memorial had an option to transfer automatically because he had just died (he was literally added to findagrave we had even gotten home from hospital)…I started getting more comfortable with requesting transfers but sometimes in the memorial owner’s bio they don’t talk about transfers so I get too scared to ask for a transfer.
I've tried to get my Father and half-brother's transferred and they will not respond, even though they are still active on the site. Happy to hear you could become manager of your Mother's.
@@ryan-m I'm glad you've become more comfortable with asking. It doesn't make any sense to have non-relatives in charge of our loved ones memorials. Don't be afraid to ask!
@@websoldier4576 I'm sorry to hear that they are not responding to you:( I'm not sure if there is any alternative way to get memorials transferred. If I come across a way to do it, I will leave you a note:)
@@sherij7330 Thanks!
Really good points, esp abt the search field elimination.
Great video! Thanks.
Thank you so much Amy. I removed both birth and death dates and got good results. Gosh, I love you.
Thank you, very useful information
There are numerous occasions where two different cemeteries are conflated with one another. [The one that comes immediately to mind for me is Montefiore Cemetery in Queens, NY, and New Montefiore Cemetery on Long Island. I have found duplicates with one in each, and when I tried to have F-A-G consolidate them, the suggestion was rejected because the cemeteries are in different locations, even though all of the information (and sometimes the photographs) are the same.
Thank you, great information, and by the way, your hair looks great too!
Somebody went to my Facebook page and got a picture. They then put it on my Dad’s findagrave page. It was a pic of my dad in law. Took me 7 years to get it taken off. The last time I visited the site I found a friend of mine has added all kinds of info to my mom, dad and brother’s pages. Things I’d rather not be public. But it is what it is. Anybody can access and mess with your loved ones’ pages. I’m not going back. It’s better not knowing.
I have created pictures for find a grave. Very fulfilling.
Love your hair cut. Nice video.
I use it in conjunction with Ancestry. It takes some work... but using BOTH (free version of Ancestry) has really helped me through the years.
I’ve been connecting my great grandparents with their children on Find-a-Grave. I have been including obituaries for each of the memorials so visitors can check the data for themselves. I had to create one memorial from scratch, as that boy was drowned and the body never recovered, but I attached his memorial with his sister’s grave site, with a comment about that. Coverage is patchy with these memorials. Many cemeteries only have memorials that were created by family members; many cemeteries do not include graves that have lost their stones; if you find a cemetery that is complete, it will no doubt be because some genealogist made a passion project out of it and got a lot of help.
I have found that cemeteries are not the ones who enter this data
Fantastic advice!!!! I am a genealogist and I go to find a grave and peoples genealogy pages ONLY for clues. Soooo many mistakes. The burial itself is correct however the added information may not. I am one that if I can not be certain with documents or census lining up kids with another census. I call it a could be... probably be.... but I do not add that to my information. I write books. I put a note about something then they can decide. Now a example. My great great grandfather. I went to the county clerks office and she was so kind to give me his death certificate. On his death certificate it says he was buried in Elm cemetery. Caton ny is a country setting not many people live there now and back in 1911 very few. The own cemetery people manage this cemetery do not have him listed as buried there. There is no stone as I looked. Sooo even if you search and they don't have your listed they could still be buried there. Records are the most important. Nice video!!!❤
Interesting information! So I did a quick-ish search for an ancestor several generations back whose DOB and DOD weren’t available close by. His name was all I entered in the search. I found him (on page 5 or 6 of about 15 pages of men with the same name) because my aunt had added a photo of him that I sent her. His burial information was unknown as family lore has it that he left Texas for Missouri at age 70-ish on horseback and never made it home. I hadn’t any idea that people could enter names when there was no known (to them) burial site. My aunt provided a lot of information from my careful mother as well as my aunt’s opinion of who his parents might have been.
thank you Amy, wise words and great tips! Off to watch the wild card video now 😄
There's also the fact that some people just don't have any type of memorial at all. My uncle was cremated & my aunt still has his ashes. My father was cremated & we released his ashes into the ocean. My sister passed last year & my nephew still has her ashes but is planning on spreading some in the mountains next month. There's no memorial for any of them. But of the family with grave sites or memorials, I had to connect my paternal grandmother's entire family! She had 4 siblings, one of whom is still alive at 103(!!), & they weren't connected & neither were her parents! A big problem with her twin sister was that her maiden name isn't listed on the memorial, so I just had to make sure the dates, married name, & cemetery were all correct. Since she passed before I was born, I had to verify w/ family members where she should be, who she was married to, & when exactly she passed.
I created mom's when she died and noted that I have half of her ashes and my one surviving sister has the other half. When I die, my half will go to the sister. What she does with it then is up to her.
Here is one to watch for , my grandma and her next older sibling have been mislabeled as to their birth year . The problem seems to have started with the 1880 US census and somebody not reading the upper part of the page where it gives me date that the information was collected. Their birthdays came after the census taker visited . Not really a big deal , but grandma was born in 1876 the Centennial year .
I've noticed a lot that the cemetery listed on some memorials are different that what was listed in the obituary, so it's little confusing at times. I used the site to fill in some of the gaps in my family tree.
I looked up my mother on Find a Grave and was surprised to find a photo that I had never seen before and an obituary with information I did not know and had not submitted. All I saw were some initials of the person who had submitted that information. Since I am my mother's only relative still alive I would be very interested to know who submitted all of her information.
Anybody! A girl took a terrible pic of my father’s grave site and refused to take it down. Find A Grave removed it for me. Memorial managers (I am his) can not remove pics. Only thing we can do is edit everything else.
The last time I was in my home town, I went to visit my parent's graves. Couldn't find because of all the snow. To get a clue, I looked at the cemetery's index board and found another lady with the same name and same year of birth.
You are my number one go to research people. I cannot go thru a complete video but I can with yours. I found my grandmother on Find a Grave. She remarried her third husband. Grandmother stayed with him until her death. He died later on in years. When he died he was buried with his first wife. His wife died before he met my grandmother. Do you think this was true or family member on his side did this. Thanks
Great points!
I have to say that it is a great tool, it sometimes has faulty info, and getting it corrected can be very difficult if others are not willing to play their part. ex) Someone searching obits to mass create memorials (that's an interesting thing that happens) found my aunt's obit and saw she was originally planned to be at a particular cemetery. However, there was some mishaps or drama (I was somewhat shielded from the details) and she actually was not laid to rest there. The creator of the memorial would not update nor transfer ownership.
Her information is still not updated over a decade later.
Great info and video!
I have had instances where I have had to add 20-30 memorials that was 90 percent photographed.
I did one cemetery a couple of years ago. It was huge. I did it section by section. It took me 6 weeks. If I saw a new grave in a section I had already done, I went over, took that photo, and added that memorial too. I left a note on the cemetery's main page that I had done it all and that anyone buried after x-date was going to have to do it themselves!
Very useful video 👍 Thank you so much!
thank you for this, it was very helpful!
I've been on Find A Grave for over 20 years, First and foremost it is about burial sites. When Find A Grave was purchased by Ancestry, a lot of data was exchanged. However use caution if you are using it as a genealogical website. Bear in mind that everything you see especially the grave stone photos were taken and entered by unpaid volunteers. All memorials can be edited when information is incorrect and there is a strong support team at Find A Grave if you have resolved issues.
I've been telling those clowns at the "help desk" that others have completely ruined a cemetery that I 100% created, photographed, and transcribed. The town has more than 1 cemetery and some jackwagons keep adding memorials to the page with photo requests. I've told the people doing and FaG to remove them. One is still up. I'm so pissed off about it. It's my dad's family so I should think that I'd know better than anyone else who is and isn't buried there!
Many thanks for your video and also to the many detailed comments. I had no idea about the shoddy work on this site. I will be very skeptical in the future if I use it.
Even if someone walks through a small cemetery writes down all the info on headstones and then posts the results on findagrave what is almost always missed are all the unmarked graves and there are usually a lot of those.
I love that on ancestors that don't have a common name I can input the last name and the county and the results will be on those with that last name. Hopefully the last name is spelled correctly. I have also done the same thing with states.
I have been very blessed with Find A Grave, and family history, on both sides of my family, both going back to Germany. I would have to find the rest in Germany, and I know of other countries on my Mom's side as well. Got back to the 1600's on my Dad;s side, and some not expected good info. as well.
The video used an example of searching for someone whose death occurred after 1930 because the 1930 census showed the person was living that year. That person could have died later in the year. Search for a death occuring after the year before the census ws taken.
Good point. (But even that search wouldn't have turned up the memorial since the memorial has a death date of "unknown.")
One issue I have with find a grave is that they only show people in public cemeteries. I have an ancestor who was buried on the family farm in with a tombstone but find a grave will not let you add it since there is no cemetery to attach the memorial to.
You can add a cemetery if it isn't already on FindAGrave. If it doesn't have an official name, you would call it what the majority of the people buried there are named (like "Smith Cemetery.") There's a whole page in the help section about how to do it.
@@AmyJohnsonCrow I see, thanks for that. As far as I know, its only the one grave, I don't think others are there so I was not sure if that qualified.
@@PaulFromCHGO Little late but you can, just name the cemetery something like "John Smith Gravesite".
Some great suggestions here. I make it a rule not to take anything from FindAGrave at face value without a least one other corroborating piece of evidence. I would add that although FindAGrave may accurately record the tombstone information, the tomb itself may be inaccurate. My great grandfather's date of birth (full date) had the day and month correct, but the year on the grave said 1858. Only by finding the original church record book in the archives did I find he was actually born in 1857. This single detail opened the door to learning about his entire branch of the family. Similarly, the grave of a great, great, great grandfather was badly worn and almost illegible. Someone in a later year added a stone below giving his death date as 1888. I studied and enlarged the image of the original stone and was quite certain it actually said 1868. Only by finding 1871 and 1881 census records did I learn that his wife's status was "widowed" in those two years -- suggesting the added stone was inaccurate.
Most of these postings on find a grave are from volunteers
Also, the dark side of this is that Find-a-Grave offers points to people who put memorials on the site, so, there are people who race to be the first to get a memorial on there. Many times, it’s immediately after the death is registered and sometimes before family and friends have been notified or the person hasn’t even been buried yet. That happened with my dad.
Also, this website isn’t meant to be used solo for family tree research but as an adjunct.
That racing to get memorials up caused me head and heartaches! I posted a memorial for my mother, a couple years after she died. When it came time to add one for my father, who died in April 2022, learned that Find-a-Grave doesn't always honor the policy of family members being given control of merged memorials. Someone had created a duplicate of Mom's memorial when I asked FaG for a merger, the other person was given management control because, 'Their information was correct and agreed with the obituary.' The obit was wrong. I could have contacted the creator of the duplicate in the first place, but the person's profile was off putting. Very sad situation.
@@Gancanna Back in the late 1990s A good friend asked me if I would go with her while she went to a cemetery about 100 miles away. She was wanting to see if she could fulfill some photo requests. I decided to go. When we got to the location we discovered the location as well as the name of the cemetery was incorrect. It is difficult to explain the problem but I will try. This was in a small town in South Carolina. There was a city cemetery and a Church cemetery next to each other. We were looking for the city cemetery and were told there was no cemetery on that old road. In fact, the city cemetery was next to the church cemetery and had been that way for close to 150 years. All of the old graves had been moved sometime around the end of the US Civil War. That night back home I visited the Find a Grave website and saw somebody had mixed all those memorials up. Here's where I got a great lesson in Find a Grave politics. I am not going to name names. I will just say the owner of the site was at the time living in Utah. He had an admin that lived in the Philly area back east and another Admin that lived in California. The one that lived in California is the one that left me shaking my head. After several days I finally got a reply to the forum comment I made. What I was attempting to do was fix that situation. In a private message, this admin basically told me that unless I had proof those memorials had incorrect locations he was not going to make any changes. I made a reply that went along the lines of all it takes is a phone call to that church Pastor, the reply was I have a job and don't have the time to go chasing after things. Then he said the person that created most of those memorials is a large contributor and he did not want to upset them. As to the family deference thing, This same lady that was with me that has tried for years to get control of her grandmother's memorial. The person that made it claims to be a daughter (her aunt). The only problem is her grandmother only had 2 sons. I suspect since the sale things have not changed much.
@@Gancanna I have not ran into this problem. Normally, Find=A-Grave would look at the date the memorial was created and which ever one was created first was the one kept.
@@THE-michaelmyersI have experienced something similar. When someone has placed the memorial, and it could be a family friend, you have no right to change anything even if you are the persons child. Family lineage even if you know it’s correct they will deny. Find a Grave needs more restrictions and validations. It’s a joke at this point.
I've volunteered as a photographer for them for 6 1/2 years so far and have never heard of any point system. I know they keep tallys up of what you've done but no points. What is that? Frequently flyer miles LOL
Thank you
I've been fortunate with the site. I have had everyone I contacted either change the erroneous info, or give me managership of family memorials.
It really comes back to cross referencing and checking. Great when we find a definite one.
I always submit sources when making suggestions for edits. One person had posted something like "Genealogy without documentation is mythology," on their profile. They aren't wrong.
So glad you made this video. I have found serious mistakes and some believe that this website is a perfect reference.
auto insurance, birth certificate, checking account, credit cards, court summons, drivers license, head stones, grave sites, life insurance, marriage license, mortgage, social security, all titles [auto-home-property].....(why) is every person's name(first middle last) in all CAPITAL letters?
Two last names on my mom’s side have less than 300 names listed (281 and 288). It’s likely that the majority of those listed are relatives, though I have not gone into great depth researching them yet.
Well, a distant cousin posted that my dad was buried in a cemetery nearby where we lived. The problem? She had never been to the cemetery to prove it. My dad was cremated and his ashes were buried in a memorial garden at the church we attended across the street from the house we grew up in. Luckily, Find-a-grave edited the entry when I submitted an edit. It’s important that people who have never seen the grave don’t create posts for people.