In 1983, a project to locate and record all of the cemeteries in Jefferson County was begun by the Jefferson County Historical Society. A chairperson and committee were appointed and members were sent out to record the cemeteries in the area in which they lived. An article in the newspaper asked the public for assistance in locating these cemeteries, and yielded many leads.

Cemetery names were assigned in a variety of ways. Sometimes they were based on the predominate surname recorded from the monuments. Other times the name was based on who owned the property in the older county atlases, or on the present owner of the farm on which it was located. While these were good general references, through deed research I have been able to establish many "official" names for these cemeteries.

Early recorders did not have the technology now available to us. Unavoidable mistakes have been made, but we are taking every care possible as to the accuracy of these transcriptions and naming of the cemeteries.

Our efforts continue and there is no end in site. We are in the process of revisiting all of the cemeteries to see how much destruction has occurred over the last 20 years, photograph the monuments to verify transcription accuracy, get exact GPS locations for future research, and compile the information into a form you can freely access on our web site. As new photographs of existing listings become available or a new deed is found to indicate an official name for a cemetery, these records will be updated to reflect this new information.

There are too many people who have contributed to this project to mention, both members and non-members. I would, however, like to personally thank you, the citizens of Jefferson County for your help in locating these "windows in time". Without your help many of these cemetery sites would become lost to history. This is the heritage of our future generations.

Dave Hallemann Sleuth.em@sbcglobal.net
Vice-President, Jefferson County Historical Society 2006