Have you heard of Billion Graves?

Have you heard of the Billion Graves projects? 

It is

a dream to record 1,000,000,000 graves in cemeteries throughout the world. Greg and I have become involved with this Billion Graves Project during our spare time. We simply set up an account on billiongraves.com and downloaded their app on our smart phone. We find a local cemetery, of which there are so many within an hour drive. Once at the cemetery, we open the app, click "take pictures" and aim our camera at a grave marker and presto, our photo is waiting for upload. We take one photo after another moving along the rows in the cemetery. It is so simple to do.

Yesterday, we took over 200 photos in two cemeteries. If all you want to do is take photos, you upload them into the Billion Graves database and your done. We chose to take it another step after returning home. We log on with our laptops and locate all our photos. We then transcribe or index the names, birth dates, and death dates. It takes very little time to help so many people researching their ancestors.

The information is stored and available for people throughout the world. Billion Graves is an expansive family history database of records and images from the world's cemeteries, all tagged with GPS locations. Volunteers capture headstone images and upload them to their site. Billion Graves is linked with FamilySearch.org 

Searching for our ancestors is one of greatest purposes of the internet worldwide. There are many tools to find our ancestors including Familysearch.org, Ancestry.com, and MyHeritage.com. So, BillionGraves.com is another source of information, especially in areas where no other records are available. We are living in Slovakia, which was ruled by the Communist Regime up until 1989 and not sure how available records may be. We notice hundreds of small villages dotted throughout the country side and everyone seems to have a small cemetery with some very old forgotten graves.

We recently heard a talk from a member of the Quorum of Twelve Apostles, who stated "God, in His infinite capacity, seals and heals individuals and families despite tragedy, loss, and hardship." Family history is important to connect families to one another, and to understand who we are. When we die we will have the opportunity to meet our ancestors, not just our grandparents but way back. Every person who lived on earth is part of a giant family tree and we are all connected in the human family since Adam & Eve. 

Do you know what unique stories are part of your ancestors?