Billion Graves vs Find-A-Grave: What's the Difference?

 

What IS the difference between these two "finding grave memorials" websites? 

Both Billion Graves and Find-A-Grave do have similarities. Both websites have cemetery data.The biggest and main difference is that Billion Graves included the GPS coordinates which, they say, follows the Genealogical Proof Standard.

Billiongraves.com was begun in 2010 with the stated mission to provide accurate gravestone data with both images and GPS coordinates. To date, the website has millions of headstone images and they're closing in on nearly two million records.

Find A Grave started in 1995 with the stated mission to post memorials, remembrances and virtual flowers first for celebrities and then for every-day people. They now exceed two million records. 

As I see it today, the best thing for you to do to understand the differences is to click to both sites and click around, seeing what they offer and how the data offered. Pick a little cemetery that you know of and see if there are transcribed memorials for that cemetery. 

Additionally, you can take your own grave marker photos and upload them to both sites, and you can assist with the indexing of the tombstone information. 

Today's Laugh: Many in the Northwest are elk hunters; I hope they and you get a laugh from this postcard. It reads "The morning after the last day of elk season. Idaho." These delightful cards are the creation of Paul Stanton and produced by Clay Salzman. He offers a bunch of similar cards; click to www.duckboy.com.  (He did give me permission to use this image.) 

Is Find-A-Grave only for people???

 

Quite apparently not.  Have you found any other listings for other-than-people??????

What Is the Difference Between Billiongraves and Find-A-Grave?

BillionGraves and Find-A-Grave are two very wonderful, and very useful, websites for finding the final resting place of an ancestor. There are many similarities between the two but BillionGraves does one thing differently that really sets them apart. They feature attaching GPS coordinates. 

Rather than scribe here 1000 words, I encourage you to click to https://blog.billiongraves.com for Parts 1 and 2 of their blog post explaining the differences. 

Another chapter in your Genealogical Learning Book, eh?

Memorial Day Events and Activities

While many of our members may be out at the lake, or camping, or visiting relatives over the three-day weekend, some of us are still in town. The Spokesman-Review has a listing of area events to honor our military dead, one of which is the dedication of the new Washington State Veterans Cemetery near Medical Lake.

You might also like to check out my Special Offers page on my personal genealogy blog, AnceStories: The Stories of My Ancestors. I have a listing of all known sales, contests, and freebies being offered in the genealogy world this holiday weekend.

Another activity you may like to do is to create memorial pages for free at the Find A Grave website for your ancestors and relatives. If you would like to really focus on your military ancestors, submit information to the Sons of Union Veterans National Graves Registration Database (they also take submissions for Confederate veterans), and/or the World War II Memorial. Both sites are free to use and submit information to, and great ways to memorialize the military veterans in your families. The latter accepts information about World War II -era individuals who served in some way towards the war effort, whether or not they were actually in the military. If you have a Rosie the Riveter or USO, Red Cross, or other volunteer in your family tree, be sure to honor them! Our own Carol Nettles did a great presentation on this website for a members-only computer class, and if you would like to receive the syllabus--or a Find A Grave syllabus I created--drop me a line here.

Find-A-Grave: Family Linking Feature

For those of you who have taken my Find-A-Grave computer class (November 2006) or who have found this delightful site on your own, I wanted to let you know there is a great new feature available. I wrote a tutorial on it at my personal genealogy site here. Enjoy!

Find A Grave Site Now at 19 Million Grave Records

I noticed over at Find A Grave that they now have 19 million grave records which you can search, in their non-famous grave area (for most of us, those would be where our ancestors are listed!).

When I first starting using this wonderful site over six years ago, I believe they only had about 5 or 6 grave million records. Even a year ago, when I presented a tutorial on using this site to the Eastern Washington Genealogical Society, there were only about 13 million grave records! If you would like a copy of my syllabus from that presentation, please e-mail me at kidmiffatgmaildotcom (substitute appropriate symbols in this phrase).