FindAGrave Errors

Many years ago I signed up for an account on FindAGrave.com so that I could create a page for my grandfather and that was all. I never used it again. I look at FindAGrave memorial pages frequently but I never made another memorial page.

Yesterday I came across my grandmother's page on FindAGrave. She was listed as Clarence Agnes Earle when in fact her name was Clare Agnes Henry Earle. I reached out to the page creator and then realized that there is a tab at the top that once clicked allows you to send suggested changes to the creator. Then I learned that if you are an immediate family member of the individual memorialized on the page, you can claim it if the individual has passed less than a year ago or if the creator is willing to relinquish it. So that is what I did! I am now the manager of my grandmother's page. But I now also have two FindAGrave accounts by accident really. C'est la vie.

As grandma's page manager now I can do a bunch of things like link her parents' memorial pages to hers. As well as choose whether or not to let it be known that I am not only her page manager but also her grandchild. Fancy.

However extremely useful a resource FindAGrave is for genealogy research, a lot of novice genealogy researchers do not understand that FindAGrave is not a record. FindAGrave is a free online resource that helps people locate burial sites of individuals, primarily in the United States, but also internationally. In addition to searching for graves, users can create memorial pages and contribute information about the deceased whether to commemorate loved ones or to share local history information. It is a crowdsourced resource though, fraught with well-intentioned errors. It does not typically connect to vital records confirming the dates of death and relationships detailed on the memorial page. It does not even always show an image of a headstone, if one exists. The memorial page could be built by anyone; a family member, a cemetery employee or volunteer, etc. FindAGrave memorials are not vital records.

Use it, of course! Tell them Clarence Agnes Earle sent you.

....but remember that all genealogical "facts" need to be corroborated by independently created resources.