Online map connects living to cemeteries across Dubois County

Cemeteries dot the landscape of Dubois County providing glimpses into the history of the settlers of this area.

Small plots with maybe a dozen or half a dozen markers emerge from copses of trees along the rural roads — private places of peace for families and their past generations. Volunteers have identified 182 cemeteries across the county and a recent project at the Jasper Public Library has mapped the locations of 125 of these (so far).

Jordan Schuetter, experience manager at the Jasper Public Library, compiled the list of cemeteries and plotted them on a Google map.

You can access the map from the library’s website here or click on the link in the embedded map above.

Schuetter said he became interested in creating the online resource as he was looking at a printed map on the wall at the Jasper Public Library’s genealogy room. “We have had this big cutout up in our genealogy room that has been there for longer than I have worked here,” he explained. “Somebody tagged general locations of cemeteries in Dubois County.”

He thought that it would be useful and garner more interest in these sites if he could create something accessible online.

Using a genealogical website that listed sites in Dubois County, many with GPS coordinates, Schuetter plotted points of many of the cemeteries in the county.

However, not all of the cemeteries in the county were included on this site so Schuetter used notes from George Wilson’s historical writings to compile more sites with general locations. “The ones I didn’t have too much information on, I just stayed away from because I didn’t want to guess too much,” he said.

From these resources, he has mapped about 125 cemeteries and is seeking information on more to continue to build the database.

Schuetter was surprised by the number of cemeteries throughout the county. “I didn’t realize how many small family cemeteries there were,” he said. “There is a decent amount that only have about six grave markers that are out in some woods or in the middle of a field.”

He added that anyone seeking out these cemeteries should be aware that some are on private property. Some can be viewed using Google’s satellite tool — small plots in the middle of farming fields or wooded areas can be seen.

“Cemeteries are pretty valuable when it comes to historical resources,” he said. “They are reminders of settling patterns, the locations of little villages, and in Dubois County, the location of little communities and what families lived in those communities.”

Cemeteries connect the living to the past in many ways. Whether it is the geographical reference points connected to those families and their settling patterns as the county formed or just the wonder of the life lived in the dash between those two dates found on a marker and the added introspection into our own dashes, these sites provide depth and connections between our lives and those lived in the past.

Here is one of the resources Schuetter used to map these sites. http://ingenweb.org/indubois/cemetery%20list/cemetery%20list%20alpha.html