Best trick EVER to read old Gravestones given by a stone carver! PART 1
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- Опубліковано 26 чер 2024
- We are all guilty of trying every trick in the book to read old gravestones. Almost all of these methods can over time harm the stone. This is a hands off approach used by researchers that will help preserve our old stones for many more years. David is a Professional Grave Stone Carver who tells his method for viewing stones that he has used to write his book, " A Brief Treatise on Tomb and Grave Stones of the 18th Century." Please pass this video along and spread the word to help preserve our stone heritage for many years to come.
www.pumpkintownprimitives.com
Link for the book here pumpkintown-108720.square.sit...
Link to one of Davids Castings of a Death Head he has for sale pumpkintown-108720.square.sit...
What impressed me even more than the cool mirror trick is watching you hand carve those breathtaking letters
Thank you so much the Lord be praised
It's all about controlling the light. You can also use a high Lumen flashlight (500 or so). A flashlight can be used to shift light up down sideways to get all angles. Especially on days when the sun is not shining. Thanks for the great work you do David.
Thank you for your interest Mr Shaw!
Thanks, that is so interesting! I'm glad you brought up the flashlight, as I live in Alaska where it rains a lot...I just learned about zinc headstones, I love near a cemetery and wish I had known all this stuff before!
I love your wife's charisma during the modeling of the mirror while you described it. Hilarious to show personality while not talking
Yes she enjoyed that I do believe! Lol
The stones you have carved are STUNNING!!! You’re a true artist.
Thank you kindly! Please subscribe!
@@pumpkintown subscribed!
I am teaching a cemetery field course in the fall and we tried this technique this morning. We were amazed at the results.
Praise the Lord! Great! Please pass this video and more importantly the technique along. Help preserve our stones for future generations! Thank you!
My friend your carving is stunning... I hope you are still around when it's my time.
Thank you Jeff, it would be my pleasure. You know if you order before it is needed you will ensure you get what you want and be sure you get "the last word" just saying!
@@pumpkintown love it!
Why?? One day you will be dug up and thrown into a mass grave.
Very clear directions that really illustrate the value of adding a mirror to one's bag of tricks.
Thank you kindly, the Lord be praised!
Your carved stones are gorgeous.
Thank you very much. I praise the Lord that I get to do what I enjoy!
Your carving of the gravestone is breathtaking. Its so beautiful and an act of love to put so much skill and work into your art. The mirror trick is so simple that i said out loud to myself why didn't i think of that! The graves that you showed us are so old and hopefully thanks to your photos will be seen and appreciated for the long future. I am in Melbourne Australia and am going on a vacation to fix some of my relatives graves. I'm definitely taking a mirror with me to photograph them properly.
Thank you for this kind message. I hope you enjoy much success with the mirror trick!
Remote rural off grid NSW here .
I'm now almost 69, and am an avid family genealogist. I wish I had known this many years ago! Good for you, and good luck.
I felt the same way when I was shown it! Keep up the good work Mickey! It is not in vain!
Shining a flashlight flat across the stone at night time, if you can handle the spookiness, can reveal the markings on some very weathered stones
I do the same thing when carving stones in my shop. One source of light is so helpful!
I actually saw a woman using an SOS Pad to clean a stone. People who don't know what they're doing shouldn't be doing anything.
Indeed, it is horrible! Some folks use clorox to "Clean the stone" ! Awful! It has salts that will erode the stone faster. Thanks!
I have heard that a solution called D2 is best to use for cleaning gravestones. It is recommended by the Cemetery Conservation organization
@@jessicasmith5690 Yes Jessica watch my video at this link about D2 and other thoughts on cleaning gravestones if time allows. ua-cam.com/video/yz3m-FsGYGI/v-deo.html
This is a brilliant and simple technique we all need in our genealogy toolkits!! Thank you for your informative, educational video!
Thank you for being interested! I hope to keep adding more
promulgate
You really are an artist with stone sir!
God bless you, thank you
I use and LED light- same principle just a little easier to carry around... it is a wand type
Yes! And Led will work, its all a matter of Lumens and Effort! How many Lumens does the Sunlight have , and How many Lumens does an LED have? And how much do you want to see? A LED is the best alternative to sun I would think. I like the sun because nothing is brighter, & I can take a picture of the entire stone for research and documentation purposes. Sometimes when I am in a shaded cemetery and no light hardly gets in we have to use 2 mirrors! I have broken plenty let me tell you! Thanks for the great idea.
@@pumpkintown I'm usually alone. Love the mirror though
Oops...I didn't see you had already said this till after I posted...sorry😊🐝
@@pumpkintown We have an old section of our cemetery under evergreen trees that hardly gets any sunlight, haven't tried the two mirrors yet but maybe LED lights could help too?
@@roberteisenhard2829 You could certainly try it. Also try the 2 mirrors and see which does best.
I think that lettering style is pretty.
Yes maam so do I! Thank you
Great video David & Pumpkintown Primitives! I also appreciate the short "confessional" at the beginning - glad you've shared this excellent 'touchless' technique.
Thanks Adam! We are all guilty right! lol
A unique talent (carving) AND an interesting hobby that you share with your lovely wife (headstones).... You are one LUCKY guy!!
Yes sir to God be all the glory! Thank you
This trick is absolutely the best. I have used this for years and amazed many by showing what it will bring out.
Thank you Rich!
I leared to read by reading tombstones. My brothers liked reading them so helped me read them.
That’s a great way to learn to read, learn history, and become a student of the brevity of life
I grew up in central NJ. I attended an Episcopel church with a surroundings cemetery. Many close to the church were a faded redstone with dates in the late 1700's. At other times I'd find small family plots in the middle of the woods while hunting. Always interested in the engravings and imagining the type of lives they lived..
I find myself thinking along the same lines.
Thank you so much. I have tried so many times to explain to people why some of the things they are recommending are so destructive. Now I can refer them to this. Beautifully explained and non-judgemental. This matters to me because I have seen two entire graveyards in which "cleaning" destroyed most of the inscriptions. The first I'd seen photos that had been taken: the stones were nicely readable. But when I went to the cemetery, nearly every stone was unreadable and many were corroded down to bare stone. This cemetery was one that contained the burials of 6 generations of my family, beginning in the early 1700s. I was just numb as I wandered through, trying to figure where my people were. There were the photos, taken in the late 80s, and there were also transcriptions someone had taken in the early 1900s- in pencil on paper, so the original notes! The other graveyard is near my home, and the first year I learned that I had relatives directly connected to my family I went to visit. A cemetery association had just renovated the cemetary, repaired stones, and carefully set them in place, clearing away overgrowth, but carefully retaining the roses and other memorial plants. It was beautiful. Two years later I went back and someone had done just about every dumb thing anybody could do to make the inscriptions readable. Signs of shaving cream, some kind of chemical, scraping, and I would imagine rubbing. Many of the stones were literally crumbling away. It was easy to trace the names they were looking for, all names of families that were connected, to each other and to mine. These are cousins I don't want to know.
I know it is usually well meaning individuals too, so that is why I want to put this video out as well as others. Thank you!
@@pumpkintown I have not watched all your videos, so you might have talked about this, but what do you do with headstones that are being destroyed by lichen?
@@mbmochinski Great question. I recommend finding a professional who is a member of the AGS to clean the lichen. Lichen can cause big problems, but folks can get too aggressive and remove data on the stones as well.
I second that emotion
8:26 "Gravestone Nerd", LOVE IT !
Thank you!
I really admire your craft, David! Thank you posting this helpful video that offers practical & easy tips for reading old gravestones!
Thank you so much! May the Lord bless you!
I joined a group on FB and have begun to cringe every time I see someone asking what to use to clean a stone and all these comments giving different things that contain chemicals. I keep sharing this video with them. I even made a new post to share this and said, sometimes the best thing to do is nothing or use the mirror method.
Please keep sharing and watch my other videos. I plan on doing more soon. Let me know if you have ideas for future videos! Thank you for your kind words!
I am very happy to find this site, very interested in our graveyards and cemeteries.
Thank you! I hope to keep posting so subscribe if you like and hit the bell icon!
Brilliant! Thanks for sharing!
all my years taking gravestone photos, I never was told this trick, sure wish I had been
Thank you! I felt the same way when I learned it!
Like all your videos so far, informative and very well done. Laura and I enjoy them very much.
Thanks Brother! I hope to keep doing these!
This is great! Thank you for sharing this trick as it will help me in the cemeteries I record.
That is great news! Please pass the technique along
Thank you so much for sharing this technique. I have never seen it but plan to use it now and share it with others.
Yes please share this technique and help preserve our old stones. Thanks Ginny very much indeed
This is where I slap my head and say, “I could’ve had a V8!”
Thanks Skip! Please subscribe and stay tuned for more videos sir!
What a clever idea! Thank you for sharing!
You are so welcome!
Thanks for this! I can't wait to try it!
Thanks for the kind words
Oh wow, your script is so beautiful. Really admire your skill & art 🌿
thank you so much!
I wish I had known this when I went to Scotland years ago and had such a problem trying to read those headstones.
Thanks Kerry. Maybe you will make it back there someday! I sure hope I can make it back there as well. Thanks for the comment!
AWESOME video!! Thanks for creating it!
Thanks for being interested! Please pass the word!
Your work is amazing! ❤️
Thank you. The Lord is to be praised!
That is a wonderful process. I am often horrified by some of the processes that people use. Thank you so much! Brilliant.
Thank you Susan I feel the same way
Thank you for this. Never heard of it before. What a help.
Thank you I hope it helps! I just added part 2 also
excellent video-- thank you so much for the information and technique. It is so important to preserve what we can...
Yes maam I totally agree thank you!
This is fantastic information! I haven't been graving in many years, but this would have made it so much easier to read the stones. I am anxious to go again, now.
Glad you enjoyed it!
This is a fabulous technique which I hope to employ and promulgate. Thank you!
Thanks Patricia!
This is brilliant! And I have shared with my family history buddies!
Thank you!!
This is a wonderful tip. It'll be very, very helpful. Thank you!
Thank you! Please share this with others to help spread the word!
Wonderful information! Thank you for sharing! 😊❤️
Thank you and Teena this video got more views than I ever thought wow!
This is wonderful information! Thank you!
Thank you for being interested! I hope to keep adding more
Thank you for sharing your knowledge. Will now check out your other videos. God bless. ❤
May the Lord bless you as well
Best new genealogy trick I have learned this year. Now if we could only devise a way to bring the sun out on a cloudy day. Thank you so much for offering your wisdom to research family history while also preserving it for others to do research.
Yes sun is the main ingredient in this recipe! Thank you! I hope to post more!
Thanks for sharing this method. I was at a cemetery a couple of weeks ago, on a sunny afternoon. It was a very wooded place, so some graves were in the sun, and the glare of the sunlight made it impossible to read, while others were in the shade, and too dark. I wish I'd known this method and had a mirror. Looking forward to trying it out.
Thanks Ted! I hope to do another video with advanced techniques so to speak for those hard to reach areas with the sun!
Thank you for your work
Thank you Eric and thanks for watching my friend.
Wow - that shadowing effect makes so much sense now. Merci for the explanations.
You are quite welcome! Thank you for your kindness
You are quite welcome! Thank you for your kindness
Excellent point about the angle of the light source on the v-cut lettering.
Thanks Glen! I felt the same way when I learned it! I hope to keep posting new videos so stay tuned
Thank you so much for the great information!
Yes ma’am thank you for being interested
Thank you, Mr. Gillespie, and your lovely assistant, Renee (Mrs. G.☺️)
Your thorough explanation was so welcome, and greatly enhanced by the dulcet tones of your sweet Carolina accent.
I was directed here from my FB genealogy group, and will share it as well with my friends.
Looking next at Part II. 😉
God bless you thank you kindly! Please subscribe and share to help get the word out!
Awesome video. Thanks for sharing this information! BTW beautiful carving work.
Thank you so kindly! To the Lord be all the Glory!
Hi~ This is a very interesting video. I love walking through graveyards and reading the inscriptions. Many thanks! I will take a large mirror with me next time. Pat from Canada
Thanks Pat! Glad to hear it has reached to Canada! Many have thought us vain while walking in Downtown Charleston SC with a mirror but they didn't know we were just gravestone nerds!
This was a wonderful video, thank you
Thank you kindly Beth, I hope to do more gravestone videos soon!
Wow That is amazing! Thank you!
Thank you kindly!
Great trick! Can't wait to try it.
Thank you Elaine! Would love to hear how it goes!
great tip about the mirror. I might try this with the photography reflector that I own and see how that goes. I have started looking for graves for other people on Find A Grave, so this is brilliant
Yes Maam this will help you catalog on Find A Grave and please subscribe and watch my other videos that may be of use for you!
My uncle was a stonemason (he did some work on the Palace of Westminster after WW2) and appreciate your great skill. May I respectfully point out that going out in the field with a fragile full-length mirror is not a particularly good idea? Far better to use a reflector or enable the flash on your camera. I use a LED Dimmable Ring Light, that can be attached to my mobile phone selfie stick.
I agree about the mirror as I have broken several. But not being a photographer, this has been a low tech solution for many including myself, and the principles still apply to higher technology as you have pointed out. The question is about Lux, and the sun is very bright and provides plenty of bright light. I am sure there are bright flash bulbs as well. I am not superstitious either about breaking mirrors as I am sure some are so you ideas are awesome and I may try to work toward that end myself! Thanks brother!
For the first couple minutes of the video, I was planning on complaining that you made a ten minute video to show a technique that could be explained in a couple of sentences.
I was wrong. Every moment of this video was worth it. Now I'm off to buy a mirror.....
You won’t regret it. I am basically trying to build my case that since I carve everyday in relief light to create the letters that is best how they are viewed. Post pictures of your results! Thanks Jeffrey
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This is so sensible - and we're going to use it in the near future. Have discovered an old (19th century) family cemetery where at least 10% of the graves are those of my wife's ancestors. Photos taken on a gray, drizzly day last year are all but worthless without major PhotoShop efforts. Will go back on a sunny day with a BIG mirror!
Yes, I would love to see and hear how it works out!
Thank you!
Thank you for sharing this technique.
Thank you for being interested Gabby!
This was a very neat trick to learn. On my channel, I travel around to cemeteries all over the place. This is very helpful. Enjoying your channel. I love visiting and documenting cemeteries. Thanks again. This will be helpful for my channel.
Thank you sir! Please subscribe as I hope to keep adding content. I am will subscribe to yours!
great video,.....well done,......i love your carving talent,....impressive.
Thank you so much. The Lord be praised!
Looking forward to trying the mirror trick. Surprised to learn shaving cream is out of fashion.
You wont need the saving cream any more! This will be less expensive and better for the stone! Thanks for your comment Doug!
Thank you so much for the "Mirror Trick".
Thank you for watching!
Amazing indeed hello from Australia I do a lot of remote travelling with my 4wD and camper trailer , am an avid photographer of old farmhouses, churches and graveyards some headstones from the early 1800's , now I may be able to decipher them will be using this trick, thank you and your carving work is excellent indeed.
That is great to hear! Keep up the fun and I hope this trick serves you well even down under!
Wonderful video. Thank you!
Thank you Ms Peggy!
thank you for that mirror trick fantastic
Great information!
Thank you! Thanks for being interested
We've got so many cemeteries in WI, even, that have people born in the late 1700's. My husband and I love to visit all the ones we can find, especially very small country ones. We just love the history and also, just contemplating what happened to families that lost many members close to each other. We know illnesses were rampant back then.
That's great that you get to visit. I hope you're photographing with geotracking and loading to a site like FindAGrave or a state equivalent. Sidestep Adventures has come across so many small cemeteries that've been destroyed. Some deliberately, some just overgrown to the point that they'd become invisible. I've also heard about stones being stolen because they're so old. Terrible.
Keep up the good work! Studying cemeteries and the history are the best ways to learn our local history. Studying others mortality also helps me to contemplate my own, and look to the Lord for answers and encouragement.
This video was very helpful for me.
Glad it was helpful!
I wish I would have known this many years ago. thank you.
I feel the same way. Thank you for your kindness
Very interesting. Thank you
Glad you enjoyed it
Brilliant work Dave. Preservation of an artform.
Thanks brother! Means a lot!
@@pumpkintown my wife's ancestors were Australian pioneer families. On a recent 4x4 trip we found an old family graveyard of her 3 x great grandfather and grandmother, etc etc. He died in 1853, fell out of a canoe crossing a flooded river. Both his and her headstones have that same individually tradesman crafted writing, very different from later work. Your work looks authentic, I love it. I might try and put the video on UA-cam, that I took.
@@redtobertshateshandles yes I would love to see it! Anything about gravestones and the history of their subjects are fascinating to me! Thanks sir so much!
The mirror trick is really good to know, thanks for that tip. We have many very old stones in our area and this will certainly help.
I have used the household flour trick which works quite well and from what I have been told, it does no harm to the stone. When it rains, the flour will wash away.
I have seen that! This is a no touch approach and can use flour to make some great biscuits!! Thanks for watching Thomas
Amazing journeys into other eras.
Thank you
Great information thank you
Thank you for watching!
Excellent video!
Thank you! I just added a part 2!
awesome, this is really useful
Thank you kindly! Please see my other videos and subscribe!
This technique is or was how they use the sun to light up the Pyramids in Egypt as not to caust damage to the Hieroglyphs. This also add a beauty to the stone naturally. Thanks for sharing, I will also!
Thank you for your kind comments and for sharing!
awesome tip! Thanks
Thank you as well! I hope to keep posting more
Great idea thanks for sharing. Hi from Ireland 🇮🇪🙏
Thank you! Hello from South Carolina! Please subscribe!
Really useful information, well described. I tend to use off camera flash because I do not get so many sunny days in my area.Very good point of getting down low when taking photographs.
Glad it was helpful! Thanks for watching!
Great information and I will share!
Thank you LaBrenda!
Well done!
Thank you!
Beautiful work ; thanks from old New Orleans 😇
Hear hear! Thank you very much! Never been there but need to try it sometime Lords willing
@@pumpkintown do to our former high water table body's had to be interred above ground
Thank you so much!
Thanks Jane!
This is extremely interesting what a talent you should be very proud of yourself we need more of these and more people to restore old tombstones you can't read
Thank you sir
@@pumpkintown I do appreciate what you're doing I'm interested in doing that myself and I do what I can but I am by myself and I don't drive but we have some very old tombstones here in Virginia that I was curious about so keep up the good work and I'm going to learn what I can no not thank me but thank you what you doing is important!
Very helpful as I have been trying to figure out how to get a picture of my great grandmother stone, one of those white maybe granite stones, 1936
From the 1930s is likely a granite. Post a picture of your results here I would love to see it! Thank you Brenda
Upstate SC, nice! I just today, cleaned my 2nd GGrandfathers granite headstone, and found your videos because his wife stone is soapstone and extremely worn down. Her death was 1899 and his was 60 years later.
Wow that is great! Watch my other videos in this series about identifying stones and before you clean if time allows! Thanks for the comment. Glad you found your families stones!
One serious problem is when you encounter marble stones on which the lettering is badly deteriorated. Then you add in the problem in some cemeteries where you have some sort of black algae on the stones, along with the usual lichen and so forth. When you have that on already deteriorated marble stones, you have a bad situation for reading them. I've heard about the mirror trick and have wanted to try it though.
Indeed , which is why it is so important that we arent adding to the problem by having someone come by every few years on marble stones and scrub them with brushes to clean them. Human erosion, is becoming more and more or a problem. Once the information is gone, it cant be brought back. Thanks for being a gravestone nerd also! Thanks for watching the video Mr Miller
Such an easy and non-destructive technique! I have gone to a cemetery at different times of day to take advantage of different positions of the sun, but never thought to take a mirror.
I felt the same way after I learned! Thank you!
Have you tried a super bright flashlight for cloudy days or forested grave sites? Most of what I want to read are in the mountains of Appalachia.
No but in a pinch that would be better than nothing for sure!
I enjoyed the video and that's a great trick.
Glad you enjoyed it
Genius. Thank you.
Thank you very much Nick!
Thanks for sharing your experiences and challenges learning your craft.
Lichenometry is improving.
Excellent presentation of lighting use to read the seemingly illegible
Thank you very much Mr Powell