How To Adopt A Township Page
If you would like to help maintain this website and are interested in sponsoring a township page, here are a few page requirements and a couple of suggestions for making a great webpage!
How Do I Adopt A Township Page?
First, make sure that the page is open for adoption -- see Muskingum County, Ohio Township Project. Then, send me email at drdx@neo.rr.com. Once, I okay the adoption of the township you can download the pages and images already created for the township or contact me and I will send all the files to you in a zip file.
Do I Need To Know How To Use HTML?
No. There are many programs available now that make it possible to create websites without any knowledge of html. Microsoft Word (Office 98/2000) has a built in internet assistant that allows you to create a word processing file and save it as html although I discourage it as it adds much redundant code. You can also use Netscape Composer (free with Netscape Communicator) or FrontPage Express (free with Internet Explorer). For AOL users, AOLPress is a freeware program available online - use keyword html or webpages.
Do I need to know FTP?
No. As of now, all township pages are sub divisions of my Rootsweb account. Only one person has access to that account and that is me. For this reason, all updates and revisions must be sent to my email address as an attachment with the subject line "MCOTP - XXXX Township Update" with "XXXX" replaced with the name of your township. A description of what has been changed and added or deleted and an attached zip file containing the necessary files to be updated. Many compression programs including WinZip can be used to create the zip file. Any questions on how to do this should be directed to me or can be found in the help files of your compression program.
Page Requirements
Once you are ready to create a township page -- you will need to include these elements on your page.
1) You must identify yourself as being part of the Muskingum County, Ohio, Township Project.
2) Maintain links to the following pages:
- Muskingum County Genealogy at http://www.rootsweb.com/~ohmuskin/
- Ohio Genweb at http://www.scioto.org/OHGenWeb/index.html
- A link back to the main Township page at http://www.rootsweb.com/~ohmuski2/ but refrenced as ../index.html.
- Also suggested are USGenWeb and WorldGenWeb links.
- Links to the Muskingum County Query Boards are available on the main Township Page so do not need to be repeated.
3) Provide a brief history of the township, addresses of local resources, listing of cemetery names, and include links to family homepages.
4) Collect pertinent township data -- cemetery or census data etc. Maps of the township would also be helpful. Complete cemetery transcriptions should be sent to me for inclusion in the cemetery pages. The link for this will be ../cemetery/yourcemetery.html.
5) Each page should contain your name and email address so people know who to contact with problems. It should also include a reference to when the page was last updated and a copyright date.
6) A counter link is supplied with each account but this can be transferred from my account to you so it can be edited without my intervention.
Formatting and Layout
You must use the formatting and layout of the templates provided. They are laid out so that someone visiting any of the township pages will be familiar with navigating the site. If you have suggestions on how to make the site easier to use, please feel free to submit them to me. The idea is to present information to township researchers without them having to sift through complicated navigation links and wait long periods for graphics and audio files.
If you need assistance in the beginning, please contact me. My desire is to have all our township pages online and available to visiting researchers.
What is not allowed
1) For obvious reasons, copyrighted material should not be included. If you have any questions as to what a copyright is, or what is or is not in the public domain, please visit the U. S. Copyright Office home page or the following link gives a quick view of what is considered to be in the public domain.
2) Extensive Graphics. By extensive, I mean using more than the supplied graphics or one image on the index page. No animated graphics, bars, backgrounds, or icons other than those supllied. These take lots of time to load and serve no actual purpose. Keep things spartan and uncomplicated. Save the flashy graphics for your own website. One image is allowed on the front page and with a little creative programming, you can make this graphic change periodically.
3) Audio Files. No Midi, MP3, wav, aiff, or any other format. Many people's systems cannot handle them or choke when a page has to load an audio file before presenting the rest of the data. Save them for your own website.
3) Commercial content. No advertising or links to a commercial site is allowed. Rootsweb has a strict policy on this and any site found with any commercial content will be removed.
What is allowed
Other than what has been described above, you may create pages for images of the township or historic buildings and places within the township, map images, links to other sites with content related to the township, links to users homepages with township related content, biographies of township residents, family descendancy charts (text only, no gedcoms) and any other township related material.
Remember if you are providing a link to someone else's site, be sure to contact them and get their permission. Do not copy another site's contents without permission of the owner.
Sound like too much technical programming?
If you have read all of this and find that it sounds too technical for you but you still would like to contribute data on a township or two, just drop me a note at drdx@neo.rr.com and explain to me what you have and how you would like it presented. I will take care of adding it to the township page(s) and crediting you for the contribution. You won't be actually maintaining the pages but will actively be involved. I don't expect everyone to possess as much knowledge on maintaing a website as a professional programmer like myself does and a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing in the wrong hands so if you don't think you are quite up to the challenge, just consider being a partner by compiling your data and sending it to me to be added to the site.
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This county is part of the USGenWeb Project, a non-profit genealogical resource web system, and is maintained by Denny Shirer
Last Revised: June 17, 2002
Some sections authored by Carol Hepburn, Somerset Co., PA webmaster