Cleaning up the Past

When I started the blog in 2012, I made a list of goals for the year.  For continuity's sake, I want to report what has been accomplished from that list.

• photograph local family headstones
• ONGOING PROJECT
• visit Wheatland
• DONE
• find burial info for Kate Lucy Waters Moran and her father, Michael!
• PARTIALLY DONE (Kate found, not Michael)
• find out what county in Ireland Patrick J. Moran is from
• DONE pending further documents (niece reported that her father, Patrick's brother, is from Dingle, Kerry)
• create a spreadsheet for all the people in the tree, cross-referencing all of their in an index
• NOT DONE
• create "profiles" for all the people in the tree using the index and spreadsheet
• NOT DONE
• scan ALL the images from family members that I can
• NOT DONE
• get photos of headstones for the family where location is known (via findagrave.com)
• ONGOING PROJECT
• get tracingtheivy headstone cards made (via Hector)
• NOT DONE, may choose to not do this
• take at least two volunteer photos per month for findagrave.com
• NOT DONE

In terms of photographing local relatives' headstones and scanning all the family photos I can, that will just have to be an ongoing project.

When I visited Wheatland, I only managed to go to the cemetery, but I was able to photograph all my known relatives there.  My grandmother mentioned that even in the worst heat there, she would always feel a breeze by our family's plot (or her son's headstone, I can't remember).  I felt it, too.  I didn't make it to the family ranch, but someday I'll get there.  It's rented out I believe, but I still want to see it.

I did finally find Kate Lucy Waters Moran's burial plot.  A very nice volunteer braved the snow in Massachusetts and with the map I provided, she found her.  Unfortunately there's a blank spot where her headstone should be.  Her husband is buried with his second wife and some other people, children if I recall.  

I still want to create some kind of spreadsheet and profiles for everyone, but soon I'm going to look into organizing my research with Evernote, so that goal may actually turn out differently.

As for two volunteer photographs  per month for findagrave.com, I wasn't able to do that, but I may have time now.  I'll think about doing this, but I don't know if I'm going to leave personal cards.  I'm thinking they might blow away in the wind and become trash, and I don't want to anchor them into the ground.  Maybe I'll just leave a flower.