SOUTH CAROLINA's GOLDEN-CORNER GENEALOGICAL PROJECTS Author: Paul M. Kankula, 04-17-2010 ABOUT US VOLUNTEERS: PAUL M KANKULA at nn8nn@bellsouth.net, is a General Electric Company Sales Engineer retiree from the Detroit MI area. My hobbies are computers, database compiling, website design, and ham radio (NN8NN). I'm called a County Coordinator. GARY L FLYNN at ke8fd@bellsouth.net.com, is a United Parcel Service retiree from the Columbus OH area. His hobbies are hiking and ham radio (KE8FD). Gary manages all our cemetery GPS Mapping. REMEMBERING & PRESERVING OUR PAST HERITAGE: We who research our family's history are normally very good at remembering, but, our memories only last as long as we remain in good mental health. Some of us have realized the shortcoming of our faults and have prepared a Family Tree for our younger family members use. Others of us simply say they wish they had done it before their old folks died off. Others simply don't care about their family's past heritage. Our current Family Clan might say that Grandpa Elmer Hunter's family is buried on Tall Tree Mountain, near the old Crestwood Mill, near the intersection of Larken and Butterfield Roads in Sunset, on Bubba Simon's farm, 200 yards in back of the big Oak tree in their west meadow. The next generation will probably say that Great Grandpa Elmer is buried up on Tall Tree Mountain near Easley - on some old farm. Then the next generation will most likely say that their kinfolk are buried on some mountain that's located east of Atlanta. It's amazing how quickly we forget with the passing of time..! Wouldn't it be nice if we could leave precise cemetery finding instructions for our descendants future use? Wouldn't it be nice if there was a place where we could also permanently store our family cemetery tombstone inscriptions and also be able to include additional detailed information on our love ones? Like the names of their siblings, parents, grand parents, marriage date, etc.? A storage place where this information would be available for worldwide Internet researching. That place is called the "GenWeb Archive Project!" GenWeb is a worldwide, non-profit, Internet organization that focuses on the permanent preserving of information for on-line genealogical research via a Personal Computer. The Project is non-commercial and fully committed to free access for everyone. Every county in the United States normally has a volunteer coordinator like myself. FAMILY HERITAGE PRESERVING: Many of you may be asking yourselves why it is so important to electronically preserve your records (Bible info, letters, obituary notices, photographs, etc.) in The GenWeb Project Archives. After all, genealogical and historical societies have been publishing books on these kinds of records for years. Unfortunately, books sitting on a library shelf will slowly decay with the passing of time. Copies of reference books are available in public libraries, the LDS Family History Centers, and in many other locations. However, the GenWeb Archive Project provides an ease of world-wide access to records that libraries cannot provide on-line. The GenWeb Project Archives is an extremely large, comprehensive and ever- growing repository of genealogical and historical data. They have a search engine that makes it simple for a researcher to search an entire state for a particular name or record. A record repository like this provides easy access to records from the comfort of their home. MY GOLDEN CORNER GENWEB PROJECT HOLDINGS: 100,000+ On-line Tombstone Inscriptions! 350,000+ On-line Vital Records! 10,000+ On-line Church & Cemetery Images! 300+ On-line Family/Church Histories! 10,000+ SC Cemetery Google Map hyperlinks with GPS Mapping Values! SOUTH CAROLINA CEMETERIES SC Cemetery Project: http://rootsweb.ancestry.com/~scoconee/Cemetery_GPS/ ANDERSON COUNTY PROJECTS Anderson Project: http://rootsweb.ancestry.com/~scandrsn/ OCONEE COUNTY PROJECTS Oconee Project: http://rootsweb.ancestry.com/~scoconee/ PICKENS COUNTY PROJECTS Pickens Project: http://rootsweb.ancestry.com/~scpicke2/ CEMETERY LOCATION PRESERVING: In 1978, our Department of Defense started to create a network of 24 satellites intended for military applications. This was called the Global Positioning System (GPS). They wanted to give field soldiers the ability to tell where they were located, in what direction they were going, and how far they had to go. The satellite network was completed in 1994. In the 1980's, the government made it available for civilian use. There are no subscription fees or setup charges to use the GPS system. The average cost of a GPS receiver is $100-$200. A GPS receiver must lock on to the transmitted signal from at least 3 satellites. Once this takes place, the GPS receiver compares the time a signal was transmitted by a satellite with the time it was received. The time difference allows the GPS receiver to determine its exact latitude and longitude position. Today's GPS receivers are extremely accurate to within 10-30 feet. If you connect your GPS receiver to a laptop computer, you will be able to view the following. - Your present location (which changes as you drive). - The location of your destination. - The driving route to your destination. In 2007, we decided that we would try and use our skills to GPS Map all the cemeteries in South Carolina..! Well, we didn't actually visit each of the 10,000+ cemeteries, but we did estimate & compile all their GPS values so that they will place you within a stone's throw. SC Cemetery GPS Mapping Project: http://rootsweb.ancestry.com/~scoconee/Cemetery_GPS/ FINAL COMMENTS: It's amazing what my friend Gary & I have been able to accomplish, but we didn't do it alone! I have 11 volunteer "Angles", who type for me and live all over this nation - from MI to FL, from CA to WV. I even have a volunteer proof- reader in the country of Switzerland. I certainly can't forget to mention my 2 computer Geeks who answer all my technical questions. Then there's the volunteer who reduces all my donated cemetery image file sizes for me and another one who does my Excel & Word file conversions. Then there's SCIway.net that host this project on their company's server... Gary & I have spent thousands of dollars and over 11-years of spare retirement time, in order to bring you these GoldenCorner county homesteads. Our only reward is knowing that all our hard-work will be permanently preserved in the GenWeb Project Archives and enjoyed by endless generations to come.