Bio
"In each family, there is one who seems called to find the ancestors. To put flesh on their bones and make them live again, to tell the family story and to feel that somehow they know and approve. Doing genealogy is not a cold gathering of facts, but instead, breathing life into all who have gone before. We are the storytellers of the tribe."
Found on now-deceased contributor Sharon Goddard's profile,
I am a retired IT professional on a journey to learn more about my family history. To that end, I became a member of the Manitoba Genealogical Society and participated in its Cemetery Committee from late February 2023 to March 2026. I am also subscribed as a digital member of the Manitoba Historical Society.
My home is located in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, which I acknowledge is in Treaty 1 territory and that the land is the traditional territory of the Anishinaabeg, Cree, Oji-Cree, Dakota, and Dene Peoples, and the homeland of the Red River Métis Nation, served by water sourced from Treaty 3 Shoal Lake 40 First Nation and electricity generated on Treaty 1, 3 and 5 Territory
In Manitoba and in most parts of Canada... We are all Treaty People
We all live on through the differences we make, by words and works, of love and compassion. More eyes and sharing make better memorials. Documentation isn't always available to all.
Make it FUN to be here!
One life is itself a string in the web of all our interconnected lives... i.e., anyone's "dash"!
"Genealogy without documentation is mythology"
THIS IS A CEMETERY
Lives are commemorated - deaths are recorded - families are reunited - memories are made tangible - and life is undisguised.
This is a cemetery.
Communities accord respect, families bestow reverence, historians seek information and our heritage is thereby enriched.
Testimonies of devotions, pride and remembrance are carved in stone to pay warm tribute to accomplishments and to the life - not death - of a loved one.
The cemetery is homeland for family memorials that are a sustaining source of comfort to the living.
A cemetery is a history of people - a personal record of yesterday and a sanctuary of peace and quiet today.
A cemetery exists because every life is worth loving and remembering - ALWAYS.
-- Author Unknown
I am very appreciative of other Find A Grave Contributors who devote countless hours adding stories and invaluable records, travelling, or photographing and posting photos on Find a Grave. Thanks to their efforts, I have found ancestors around the world! I enjoy being able to 'pay back' what so many others have done before me while honouring those that have passed on.
Helping others to find their past is what it's all about!
Each time I create or update a memorial I delight in thinking that it may someday provide valuable information to a genealogist or comfort and closure to a loved one.
Please, as we register their graves, let's work together to share and seek to know more about the folks who have gone before us; what they looked like, the people who shaped their lives, the lives they shaped, and where these influences happened.
Remember:
"There are three deaths. The first is when the body ceases to function. The second is when the body is consigned to the grave. The third is that moment, sometime in the future, when your name is spoken for the last time."
― David M. Eagleman, Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives
To sum this up: they were not and ARE not... just a name on a stone!
For other active and respectful contributors with closer ties, I am generally glad to transfer any memorial as per site guidelines (i.e., to direct relatives within four generations; this would be siblings, parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.). If you'd simply rather just have it updated, I am glad to do that, too.
Please feel free to copy my photos elsewhere (e.g. other aggregate grave sites, Ancestry, personal use, etc) as long as you're not profiting off of them or claiming you took them. You don't need to ask!
If and when you do copy my photos, please indicate a credit. Simply indicate " 2018-2026 Rick Dondo on Find A Grave". I'd appreciate a note letting me know you have copied them, even when you do so to other Find A Grave memorials. You may also use my photos on your own personal website if it is non-commercial, but photo credit is again appreciated.
If it's a cemetery where I took many photos, I can share a folder of all of them with you at a time, no need to download each one individually.
I'm working on a family tree on ancestry that includes the branches of all my, and my cousins'(!) in-laws; often discovering unexpected and fascinating connections. Are we related? The odds are... somehow... yes we are!
That work is reflected on my website, as noted in my contact information. Have a look! It includes a list of "media" I use in my work, many of which are simple bookmarks to online resources I have found along the way. Some of those may be of value to you in your own research projects.
If you need an obit from the Winnipeg Free Press or Winnipeg Tribune archives, I can probably find it for you.
NOTE: In an attempt to keep FG accurate, please do not send parental links that do not match the information on the memorial page. I do acknowledge that death records do contain errors but I will not change memorial information unless provided with other sources.
ALSO: When you provide information about a person represented by a memorial, be that a documented source or a narrative, your name and member number will be added as a SOURCE for others to contact for further information. Do not submit data if you do not wish to be contacted.
PLEASE!!!
If you volunteer on this website and decide you no longer want to maintain the records please transfer your records to someone who has an active account and willing to take over the records. I am one of many willing to take over records. This really will help reduce duplicates. You can, as an option, also transfer any memorials for which you no longer wish to retain guardianship to the FG administrators at account 8.
It would also be a good idea to designate a steward for your account should you go inactive without warning. There is a help topic on this process.
Thank You
(Borrowed and adapted from another FAG Contributor)
SPECIAL NOTE:
A burial plot monument or marker, as well as any information inscribed on it, have unique status under the Canadian Protection of Personal Information and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA). Care should be exercised:
https://uwo.scholaris.ca/items/2ca01702-160c-4940-9b89-f6d99895999e
"In each family, there is one who seems called to find the ancestors. To put flesh on their bones and make them live again, to tell the family story and to feel that somehow they know and approve. Doing genealogy is not a cold gathering of facts, but instead, breathing life into all who have gone before. We are the storytellers of the tribe."
Found on now-deceased contributor Sharon Goddard's profile,
I am a retired IT professional on a journey to learn more about my family history. To that end, I became a member of the Manitoba Genealogical Society and participated in its Cemetery Committee from late February 2023 to March 2026. I am also subscribed as a digital member of the Manitoba Historical Society.
My home is located in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, which I acknowledge is in Treaty 1 territory and that the land is the traditional territory of the Anishinaabeg, Cree, Oji-Cree, Dakota, and Dene Peoples, and the homeland of the Red River Métis Nation, served by water sourced from Treaty 3 Shoal Lake 40 First Nation and electricity generated on Treaty 1, 3 and 5 Territory
In Manitoba and in most parts of Canada... We are all Treaty People
We all live on through the differences we make, by words and works, of love and compassion. More eyes and sharing make better memorials. Documentation isn't always available to all.
Make it FUN to be here!
One life is itself a string in the web of all our interconnected lives... i.e., anyone's "dash"!
"Genealogy without documentation is mythology"
THIS IS A CEMETERY
Lives are commemorated - deaths are recorded - families are reunited - memories are made tangible - and life is undisguised.
This is a cemetery.
Communities accord respect, families bestow reverence, historians seek information and our heritage is thereby enriched.
Testimonies of devotions, pride and remembrance are carved in stone to pay warm tribute to accomplishments and to the life - not death - of a loved one.
The cemetery is homeland for family memorials that are a sustaining source of comfort to the living.
A cemetery is a history of people - a personal record of yesterday and a sanctuary of peace and quiet today.
A cemetery exists because every life is worth loving and remembering - ALWAYS.
-- Author Unknown
I am very appreciative of other Find A Grave Contributors who devote countless hours adding stories and invaluable records, travelling, or photographing and posting photos on Find a Grave. Thanks to their efforts, I have found ancestors around the world! I enjoy being able to 'pay back' what so many others have done before me while honouring those that have passed on.
Helping others to find their past is what it's all about!
Each time I create or update a memorial I delight in thinking that it may someday provide valuable information to a genealogist or comfort and closure to a loved one.
Please, as we register their graves, let's work together to share and seek to know more about the folks who have gone before us; what they looked like, the people who shaped their lives, the lives they shaped, and where these influences happened.
Remember:
"There are three deaths. The first is when the body ceases to function. The second is when the body is consigned to the grave. The third is that moment, sometime in the future, when your name is spoken for the last time."
― David M. Eagleman, Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives
To sum this up: they were not and ARE not... just a name on a stone!
For other active and respectful contributors with closer ties, I am generally glad to transfer any memorial as per site guidelines (i.e., to direct relatives within four generations; this would be siblings, parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.). If you'd simply rather just have it updated, I am glad to do that, too.
Please feel free to copy my photos elsewhere (e.g. other aggregate grave sites, Ancestry, personal use, etc) as long as you're not profiting off of them or claiming you took them. You don't need to ask!
If and when you do copy my photos, please indicate a credit. Simply indicate " 2018-2026 Rick Dondo on Find A Grave". I'd appreciate a note letting me know you have copied them, even when you do so to other Find A Grave memorials. You may also use my photos on your own personal website if it is non-commercial, but photo credit is again appreciated.
If it's a cemetery where I took many photos, I can share a folder of all of them with you at a time, no need to download each one individually.
I'm working on a family tree on ancestry that includes the branches of all my, and my cousins'(!) in-laws; often discovering unexpected and fascinating connections. Are we related? The odds are... somehow... yes we are!
That work is reflected on my website, as noted in my contact information. Have a look! It includes a list of "media" I use in my work, many of which are simple bookmarks to online resources I have found along the way. Some of those may be of value to you in your own research projects.
If you need an obit from the Winnipeg Free Press or Winnipeg Tribune archives, I can probably find it for you.
NOTE: In an attempt to keep FG accurate, please do not send parental links that do not match the information on the memorial page. I do acknowledge that death records do contain errors but I will not change memorial information unless provided with other sources.
ALSO: When you provide information about a person represented by a memorial, be that a documented source or a narrative, your name and member number will be added as a SOURCE for others to contact for further information. Do not submit data if you do not wish to be contacted.
PLEASE!!!
If you volunteer on this website and decide you no longer want to maintain the records please transfer your records to someone who has an active account and willing to take over the records. I am one of many willing to take over records. This really will help reduce duplicates. You can, as an option, also transfer any memorials for which you no longer wish to retain guardianship to the FG administrators at account 8.
It would also be a good idea to designate a steward for your account should you go inactive without warning. There is a help topic on this process.
Thank You
(Borrowed and adapted from another FAG Contributor)
SPECIAL NOTE:
A burial plot monument or marker, as well as any information inscribed on it, have unique status under the Canadian Protection of Personal Information and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA). Care should be exercised:
https://uwo.scholaris.ca/items/2ca01702-160c-4940-9b89-f6d99895999e
Following
Contributions
- Memorials Added
- Memorials Managed
- 18 Memorials per Week
- 12,686 Photos Added
- Photo Requests
- Volunteer Photos Taken
- Flowers Added
- Virtual Cemeteries
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