The organizers behind an effort to identify, document, and map every Revolutionary War veteran’s grave in Ohio say the project is going well. The project is part of the America 250-Ohio celebrations marking the nation’s 250th anniversary next year.
There are an estimated 7,000 Revolutionary War soldiers buried in Ohio.
"There has never been a comprehensive list made that includes exact burial locations with GPS coordinates and photographs. So that's what this project is doing," says Ohio History Connection cemetery preservationist Krista Horrocks.
She says they’re using online resources like Find a Grave and lots of crowdsourcing.
"To date, we have almost 230 individuals across the state that have helped us with this so far. We launched the project on Memorial Day, and as of just a few days ago ... [there are] over 2,200 documented graves and now 673 cemeteries documented throughout the state," Horrocks says.
Data collection will run through the end of the year. The results are being published in online maps as they’re updated.
"As we approach the last couple months of data collection, our questions are: Is there certain areas of the state we need to start focusing on? Is there large patches of veterans and cemeteries that we're not seeing? And surprisingly, the answer is no," says Horrocks.
Horrocks says there are large concentrations of graves around Cincinnati, especially in Clermont County.
"We are seeing huge concentrations in areas that we expected to see. Surprisingly, we're actually not seeing big gaps of information. We just are saying, 'Keep going; keep getting out there. Keep collecting these veterans for us.' "
The public can participate by downloading the Survey123 app and following some online instructions.
"Our big thing right now is we're in the last couple months of this data collection with the public, so we want to try to get as many more veterans documented as we can in this time period," says Horrocks.
There's also a school curriculum that encourages and enables teachers and students to participate.
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