I started volunteering for FAG when I was researching my own family genealogy. It's a great source for information, and I found many family members in my local cemeteries that I didn't know about. I'm in the Rochester, New York area and fulfill any requests for grave photos when I can. The websites I use for this area are MCNYGenealogy for maps and person look-up, and NYRGS.org for section and plot records. I try to clean up and get nice pictures of the whole family plot, not just the requested person, so that the requester can see the whole family for their research.

The city owned cemeteries are challenging, as they as they don't have the resources to keep up the graves as well as privately owned ones. I try to clean them up respectfully to take as good a picture as I can, sometimes even dig them out when they are buried. If they do not have a marker, I will place a flower bunch where it should be before I take the picture.

The reason I volunteer is that I feel the need to record these people's graves for posterity and future genealogists. I particularly am partial to recording veterans graves, as many of them gave their lives for this country.

I would hope if you are using FAG and are able, you would also join us and volunteer to take requests at your local cemetery.