RM Jones’ Adventure

Thanks for stopping back to visit. As you remember, in part one we discussed some of the problems in indexing a cemetery. In part two we talked about the process I actually went through while indexing the Glendale Cemetery in Le Claire, Iowa. And in part three we covered cleaning and photographing the headstones. Now in this part I’ll tell you about some of the other small “Old” cemeteries we also did this year.

After we completed the Glendale Cemetery I decided to do the same thing to some of the small cemeteries in this area. To start with there are two more in Le Claire, Iowa and two in Argo which is about five miles west of us. I decided to start with the two in Argo since I have some ancestors in one of them.

The two cemeteries in Argo, Iowa are the “Argo Cemetery” and the “Le Claire Prairie Cemetery” . Both are very old. The Le Claire Prairie Cemetery was started March 22, 1887. It is right in the town of Argo and got its name for the original church, The Le Claire Prairie Church, that was across the street. It is now the “Our Savior Presbyterian Church”. I’m not sure when the Argo Cemetery began because I haven’t been able to find the records for it. The person that had them died and at this time no one seems to know where they are. This means that no one else can be buried there since they don’t have a record of what plots have been used.

The clerk for the Le Claire Township was very helpful and allowed me to photograph the records for the Le Claire Prairie Cemetery. He should have also had the Argo Cemetery records but as I stated above they weren’t anywhere to be found. I will try to locate them when it gets warm. I hope when the person that had them died the people that went through his belonging didn’t burn them. The clerk for the Township also had the records for the Fairview Cemetery in Le Claire. I photographed those also. The records for both cemeteries were hand written and the original records. There was also a plot map for the Fairview Cemetery.

Basically I did the same process for these cemeteries as I did in the Glendale Cemetery in Le Claire. I used the photos of the records to create an Excel data file (I couldn’t scan them and use the OCR program I talked about in part 1 because they were hand written). Actually I found a data file on the internet that I used as a base line for the Le Claire Prairie Cemetery. I also found one for the Jacks Cemetery. If I couldn’t verify the data in the downloaded data file with the photographs of the headstones, I didn’t use it. Then I took the data file to the cemetery and went through them from one end to the other. These are very small cemeteries and it only took about a day to photograph each one. After I got all the data and photographs completed I put them on the web at Webshots.com and later at my website at http://www.rm-jones.com . All the records and photographs for these three cemeteries are posted on my site including the plot map for the Fairview Cemetery. While talking about that let me tell you what is actually there. On my website you will find the cemetery records in various formats. First you will find the Excel 2003 file so you can download it and sort data as you want. If you don’t have Excel there is a link to http://www.openoffice.org where you can get a excellent alternative to MS Office. There is also a PDF file of the records for those that prefer a PDF version and last, but most certainly not least, is the on-line version of the data file sorted to the last name / first name order with the photo numbers linked to the actual photos. All you have to do is click a number and you can see and/or download the high resolution photograph for your own use. The plot maps for the Glendale and Fairview cemeteries are also there as .JPG files so you can download them and print them on a full size sheet of paper.

If you go to my website and look at the photos you will see that some of the headstones and monuments in the Argo and Fairview cemeteries have fallen down. Other than that the cemeteries are in very good condition. I found it interesting that in the Fairview Cemetery there was a headstone or two that were hand made by someone and they either misspelled names or ran out of space and had to make smaller and smaller letters as they went along. Very interesting stones.

There is one more cemetery in Le Claire that we started. It is the “Jacks Cemetery” which is just North of town. It is larger than the other three small cemeteries but not as large as the Glendale. So far I haven’t been able to locate the official records for Jacks Cemetery but will look harder when it gets warm and I think I will be able to find it. We were about half way through the Jacks Cemetery when it got cold and we quit. We’ll finish it when it gets warm. I haven’t done anything with the data files or photos yet so you won’t find them post at my website.

What are my plans for next year? Well, there are a number of small cemeteries in this area so I plan to do them. I can think of three in Princeton, Iowa which is five miles North of us. One of them is VERY hard to find and VERY old. There is an ancient cemetery about 25 miles South of us that I find very interesting. The sign says it is the resting place of the first white settlers in Muscatine County. They came down stream from Davenport on a raft and built their homes in the wilderness. The stones are very hard to read and hard to photograph. I think I will have to learn how to do “rubbings” of these if I am going to get anything useful. Same goes for the hard to find cemetery near Princeton. If you know how to do “rubbings” of a headstone I would appreciate any tips you have to offer. Either leave them in a comment or e-mail me at Robert@RM-Jones.com . Thank you in advance.

Also, when it gets warm I plan to start Geocaching again and roaming around taking photos. I’ll try to make this Blog as interesting for you as I can so please stop back from time to time. Leave me a comment letting me know what you are interested in and if I have any experience in it I’ll try to touch on it from time to time.

This ends this series. I’ll find other topics to write on so make sure you come back. It won’t all be on cemeteries and genealogy. I promise.

Have a Great Day
Bob Jones