Gravestone Pictures

[Oddquine]

I honestly don't remember if I have asked this in the past......but if I have I don't remember the response.

I have a bit of a hobby, in that I take photos of Gravestones and upload them to my website for the benefit of those who are researching their genealogy from outside Scotland. This was not much of a problem when I was only taking photos of old stones or in the oldest parts of cemeteries, as those stones tended to date from the WWII era and earlier.

However, when I found that by wandering about picking and choosing appropriate stones, I took much longer to get less than simply by taking every stone, and, if I got back to an unfinished cemetery, I was less likely to end up with dozens of duplicates because I'd forgotten where I finished the previous time, I started taking every stone, whatever its age or legibility. When it came to uploading to the internet, I managed to pretty much convince myself that later dates, as new as the 1960s/1970s, added to old stones were not new enough to be a problem and that uploading newer stones was fine as long as there was nothing on them dating after the 1960s. Everything newer than, or old stones with newer dates at the end are in a folder for each cemetery on my hard drive.

And then I got to thinking, after I was on the GravestonePhotos site, where they have photos of stones first erected in the 21st century, that I don't think I'd be overly happy if I put my family surname, gravestones and genealogy into google, asked for images and was faced with the stone on my parents grave, used, so far between 1989 and 1999.

Given I've got about 6000 photos on my hard drive that are either online or about to be going online, and hundreds more duplicates, illegibles and stones referencing dates after the 1960s/1970s, and I really need to be rationalising them all so I can flaming well find them, if nothing else....I thought it might be an opportunity to sound out other people about what they consider the cut-off date should be for something to be considered of genealogical benefit...and given most of the newer stones are from Caithness cemeteries, I thought maybe you would be the people to ask.

[sgmcgregor]

Oddquine,

Like you mentioned in your post in regards your parents, I too would prefer my father's gravestone not be viewable online. But in saying that, the cemetery is a public place, and the stones are openly viewable by anyone who visits the cemetery, and I would imagine that there is nothing to stop them taking pictures (legally speaking) - how they can be used is another matter. The problem lies in the fact that everyone will have different views and sensitivities. Speaking for myself, it is a close personal link to someone, in the sense of having known them directly, which would be likely to be the source of any issues.

For your own protection and peace of mind you could find out what the legal standpoint is, and proceed from there - possibly also stating that you are willing to remove items if asked to do so by relatives. Otherwise, I would suggest you go with the time constraints used by archive centres - public records cannot be viewed unless they are 100 years or older.

That is my tuppence worth, but others may (and probably will) have different views.

Regards,
Steven

P.S. At this point I should also admit that I have used these types of website in my own family history research, but only when I have been unable to visit the site personally. Gravestones can be very useful in family research, and especially for details that are under the 100 year rule of archives. However, any information I find I keep for personal use only, rather than make freely available. And any information I do find, I would be able to get via a visit to Edinburgh and a little time spent in the Scotlands People (Register House) offices. So to confuse things further, the 100 year rule doesn't apply if you make a visit there - you cannot print the information but could research it if you have the mind to do so!

[Oddquine]

Oddquine,

Like you mentioned in your post in regards your parents, I too would prefer my father's gravestone not be viewable online. But in saying that, the cemetery is a public place, and the stones are openly viewable by anyone who visits the cemetery, and I would imagine that there is nothing to stop them taking pictures (legally speaking) - how they can be used is another matter. The problem lies in the fact that everyone will have different views and sensitivities. Speaking for myself, it is a close personal link to someone, in the sense of having known them directly, which would be likely to be the source of any issues.

For your own protection and peace of mind you could find out what the legal standpoint is, and proceed from there - possibly also stating that you are willing to remove items if asked to do so by relatives. Otherwise, I would suggest you go with the time constraints used by archive centres - public records cannot be viewed unless they are 100 years or older.

That is my tuppence worth, but others may (and probably will) have different views.

Regards,
Steven

P.S. At this point I should also admit that I have used these types of website in my own family history research, but only when I have been unable to visit the site personally. Gravestones can be very useful in family research, and especially for details that are under the 100 year rule of archives. However, any information I find I keep for personal use only, rather than make freely available. And any information I do find, I would be able to get via a visit to Edinburgh and a little time spent in the Scotlands People (Register House) offices. So to confuse things further, the 100 year rule doesn't apply if you make a visit there - you cannot print the information but could research it if you have the mind to do so!

Thanks for your response.

To an extent, that is my problem...the difference between wandering a cemetery and taking photos for personal use and taking photos to put on the internet for anyone to browse to help those who would not be able to see them in person.

As far as I know, Scotlands' People lets you download copy death certificates for possibly complete strangers up to 1961 and before, but do also have them indexed until 2009 and anybody and their computer literate dog can request and pay for copies of those death certificates on spec, as far as I know (saying that because I have never tried). I kinda settled for 1960s/1970s as my cut off date for all stones because my own grandparents on both sides died in the 1960s/1970s (I'm 65 nearly and they died in their 70s) and to find their stones on the internet wouldn't upset me as much as finding those of my parents.

(As an aside, why is anyone surprised at the level of identity theft when identities are available on the internet for the payment of a tenner or so!)

I can't find anything about legality of using your own pictures, but lots about using other peoples'..so inclined to think there is no problem in this "if it exists it can be online as long as you have copyright" age.

The remark about stating that you are willing to remove items if asked to do so by relatives would be an option..but then I have the problem that a lot of folk who enter my site via search engines, never actually see any of the index pages for either the whole site or any of the subdomains.

Part of my reason for trying to ascertain an acceptable cut off date for Gravestones is that I am intending to rejig my pages to link back to my main site and the appropriate subdomain/site as/when I can find the time, so that everybody is aware of my few "rules/requests" to which I could then add the above......and as I will be having to check everything out, it will also be an opportunity to rationalise my 36 gravestone sites, remove inadvertent duplicates.....and also the photos which people might deem offensive/upsetting.

[Peterd500]

a tricky problem.

Normally the accepted rule is that one doesn't publish information about the living in a public forum, such as the internet, without the permission of the living. If you are 6 foot under you can't be described as living.

It does get a bit tricky with the immediate generation just gone because their information can be used more easily than that of previous generations to find out about the living thus invading their privacy and compromising their security plus, as you say, there is sensitivity attached to such graves in that the immediate living descendants may not want their parent's details in public view. The deaths of our parents in particular or similarly near relations or even just close friends are hard pills to swallow and there is a lot of emotion invested in their burials and headstones.

On any database I have on the internet I get around the problem by stopping my database at the level of my grandparents' generation. My grandparents died 1934, 1948, 1964 and 1971 and I'm in my mid to late fifties now. I tend to make the birth cutoff 1920 (it used to be 1900) but if that still leaves living people in a database then I make the cut off even earlier to take them into account. That way the living cannot be located on any database of mine on the internet. Trying to work out who I am or my siblings and cousins are from my deceased grandparents' details is not such an easy task as from my parents' details. A researcher would have to be truly dedicated to the task to want to find out about us.

Your problem, as you have stated, is that many headstones have a mix of old death information and recent death information on them, and to apply a cut off to them is to lose the benefit that researchers can have by locating such images.

The only way around it is to put an index online and make it known that images exist for the benefit of private enquirers. But who wants to transcribe your 6000 headstones or deal with perhaps frequent enquiries? Most cemeteries have indexes but they are not necessarily online which is why someone like you making the images available can help so much.

I haven't actually provided you with a solution, just some thoughts.

Peter