10 Things You Never Knew About Funeral Home History
10 things you never knew about funeral home history? Yes. Burial ceremonies have existed since the beginning of time but many traditions have changed. Our ancestors’ experiences when someone died were quite different from our own. The first funeral home in the United States was…
What’s New, BillionGraves? 10 Great New Features!
What’s new, BillionGraves? Well, a LOT! Here are 10 great new features for you to explore on the BillionGraves website. There’s something here for every BillionGraves fan! So whether you are a volunteer photographer, transcriber, or family history researcher, these new features are sure to…
10 Steps to Planning a Group Cemetery Event
Across the world, gravestones are deteriorating, and erosion is erasing the precious details of our ancestors’ lives. BillionGraves, the world’s largest GPS-linked cemetery database, can help. The BillionGraves smartphone app can be used to document gravestones. Then, even if a loved one’s gravestone is damaged…
Lake View Cemetery: One of the Prettiest in the World
Lake View Cemetery in Cleveland, Ohio, is one of the prettiest garden cemeteries in the world. With more than 115,000 gravestones, it is also huge. If you go, bring your walking shoes! There is something about this cemetery that makes me think of these song…
Types of Gravestones: from Fieldstone to Granite
Understanding the different types of gravestones used throughout history can help genealogists and family historians figure out when a marker was placed. Our ancestors were likely to have grave markers made of one of the following materials depending on when they lived: Types of Gravestones:…
Gravestone Cleaning Tips from BillionGraves
Gravestone cleaning can turn back the wheels of time to make your ancestor’s final resting place nearly as beautiful as the day their family members gathered there to wish them farewell. Time has been hard on gravestones that were originally considered nearly permanent. Weathering, erosion,…
10 Cemetery Walking Tours from Around the World
So if art, history, and nature are your passions, a cemetery walking tour will probably be right up your alley. (Warning: these 10 cemetery walking tours from around the world may make you get the “travel bug”!) Cemetery Walking Tour #1: Metairie Cemetery, New Orleans,…
RootsTech 2025 with BillionGraves
RootsTech 2025 with BillionGraves was an exciting and inspiring event for family history enthusiasts. Come peek over our shoulder and share our experience, as the BillionGraves team attended the world’s largest genealogy conference in Salt Lake City, Utah, March 6 – 8, surrounded by tens…
Cave Hill Cemetery – One of America’s Most Beautiful Cemeteries
Cave Hill Cemetery in Louisville, Kentucky is one of America’s most beautiful cemeteries. From the moment you cross through the majestic Victorian entrance gates at Cave Hill Cemetery, you leave the world behind. No more honking horns, traffic jams, or flashy lights. It’s all peace and…
Cemeteries by the Sea
Cemeteries by the sea range from the breathtakingly beautiful to those being threatened by erosion to wash away. Here are ten of them. Cemeteries by the Sea #1 Waverley Cemetery in New South Wales, Australia Waverley Cemetery, in the suburbs of Sydney, New South Wales,…
How to Use the BillionGraves App to Take Photos of Gravestones
Have you ever wondered how to use the BillionGraves app to take photos of gravestones? BillionGraves has some awesome volunteers, but we need even more! If you take photos of gravestones in your local cemetery, you are likely to help someone who lives too far…
Ancient Greece and the Modern Cemetery
Ancient Greece and the modern cemetery share many of the same symbols. From the flaming Olympic torch, to laurel wreaths, and classical columns, Greek influence can be seen in nearly every cemetery in the Western world. Beginning about 800 BC, the wealthy elite created monuments…