You can be part of a notable project by helping find headstones, photographing them, and making them searchable on the FamilySearch website. This is all part of an effort in the United States Midwest to document the burial locations of hundreds of thousands of people.
Small seeds can grow a great tree, as anyone who participates in family history research can attest. In the U.S. state of Iowa, one such small seed was planted when Joseph Miller, a local leader in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, discovered that up to 200,000 headstones in the state may represent the only physical record of a person’s birth or death. That is because, in Iowa, public vital records were not kept until 1880, but the state had a growing population beginning in the early 1800s.
Project beginning
That realization led to a desire to find some of those headstones and document them for posterity. Miller began enlisting the aid of friends, community leaders, and fellow church members to not only document those potentially elusive headstones but any headstones in his state. At this point, the Rescuing Our Roots project was born. Hundreds of people throughout parts of Iowa, Missouri, and Illinois spent time between 8 and 11 September 2022 documenting thousands of headstones by uploading images through the BillionGraves app on their mobile devices. Those images are being transcribed and shared with FamilySearch to make them available to the public.
While the initial project was modest, Miller and others were convinced much more could be done to help preserve historical data and inspire thousands of people to engage more deeply in family history research. What led to that conclusion? “We came out with a deeper appreciation for our ancestors, our communities, and our neighbors,” Miller said, "but it was only a beginning."
With the 2022 endeavor, numerous stories came to light of headstones being found in public cemeteries that were nearly buried by grass or other plants. Younger children connected to the spirit of the effort through something as simple as sharing a first name with a deceased person found on a headstone. Other stories emerged of people finding distant relatives they didn’t expect to find—and would not have found were it not for FamilySearch’s ongoing effort to build the world’s largest online shared Family Tree. And, yes, many headstones bearing dates before 1880 were documented with the BillionGraves app.
Expanding and Reaching Out to the Community
And the seed continued to grow as Rescuing Our Roots gained new partners, including the History Center of Iowa, The Linn County Interfaith Council, and the African American Museum of Iowa. Through the global reach of BillionGraves and growing enthusiasm in Iowa, Missouri, and Illinois, 2 goals were set for 2023. The first is to document and transcribe 1 million headstones by 30 September 2023, data from which will be shared directly with FamilySearch. The second is a participation goal. How many people could be recruited to help reach or exceed the first goal? The target: 10,000. To organize and track that participation, BillionGraves.com created a unique landing page for individuals to register their participation. Progress bars allow anyone in the world to follow the effort and even sign up to participate. It is open to anyone at billiongraves.com/rescue.
Remembering Black Iowans
Local media outlets took note of the project, as did 2 historic Black churches. In partnership with them, Miller is organizing an effort to document unmarked graves of 28 Black Iowans buried at Oak Hill Cemetery in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, including the first Black nurse to work in an Iowa hospital. The location of the graves is known to local historians, but there is no digital or visual record of that location. Using the BillionGraves app, Miller and others will photograph paper headstone markers, thus creating a GPS marker for the graves that will be attached to the person buried at the spot. History will be preserved for future generations.
And while participants are energized around the project's fun and exciting goals, the real power of Rescuing Our Roots that continues to attract volunteers and partners is the one-by-one impact. For example, while Miller was presenting the project at one of the historic churches in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, during Black History Month, he learned a member of the congregation had been searching for his brother's headstone for 21 years. Immediately pulling up the BillionGraves app, Miller was able to locate the grave for this devoted brother.
Join in the Effort
With each bit of growth from that first small seed, new discoveries are leading to new opportunities to bring people together in the great family tree. You can follow this project on Facebook and Instagram. Consider registering before June 24 to help Rescuing Our Roots volunteers reach their goal. Doing so will also help the FamilySearch Family Tree grow even larger, allowing more and more people around the globe to find and connect to the stories of their ancestors and relatives.
