Site News Archive

January - June 2008

Current News | July - December 2008

June 29
Updates have been posted to the following areas:

Baptism Collection: Approximately 100 baptisms added for the Village of Watertown and surrounding area (1815-1825)
Deaths Collection: New additions posted, the majority of which are pre-1900
Marriage Collection: New additions and updates to existing entries, the majority of which are pre-1900
Sulphur Springs Cemetery, Town of Hounsfield: Updates posted as the result of recent visit, most burials in Section C
Brookside Cemetery, Town of Watertown: Updates posted on partial inventory of Section U
Orleans Cemetery (Orleans Four Corners Cemetery), Town of Orleans: partial inventory completed and posted
Grove Cemetery (aka Orleans Cemetery), Town of Orleans: Partial inventory with updates posted to approximately 500 burials

June 22
Baptism Collection updated with baptisms covering the period 1803 to 1815 for the Village of Watertown and surrounding area. The total number of baptisms on line has nearly doubled and it should grow significantly over the next several weeks as transcription of original data continues.

Marriage Collection continues to expand with both new entries and more detail being added to existing data.

Burials have been updated for the following cemeteries:
- Adams State Road Cemetery (Honeyville Cemetery), Jefferson County
- Vrooman Hill Cemetery, Jefferson County

June 15
A new collection, Family Members, has been added. This provides the ability to search all the family members that have been collected in both the Death and Baptism collections and should enhance the your ability to search for all associated family members.

Union Academy at Belleville, Jefferson County has been updated with the inclusion of Staff and Facility for selected years. We are still attempting to locate additional class rosters for years prior to 1860.

Adams State Road Cemetery, Town of Adams has been updated based on a recent visit and photo review.

Marriage Collection: work continues on converting previous information as well as adding new marriage announcements. Approximately 15% of the original information has been converted.

Deaths Collection: approximately 40% of the original information has been converted and new/additional information continues to be added.

June 8
The following is a list of updates posted to the various collections:

June 1
Cemetery descriptions have been updated to correct location and description information. It appears that some of the information didn't completely convert. Inventory status has been added to each of the cemetery descriptions. Currently we have 199 cemetery descriptions online broken down as follows:

Jefferson County: 192 cemeteries visited and online - 105 have been fully inventoried.
Lewis County: 5 cemeteries visited and online - 2 have been fully inventoried.
Oswego County: 2 cemeteries visited and online - both of which have been fully inventoried.

Evans Mills Old Cemetery, Town of Leray, has been updated with the results of the latest visit.

May 31
Savage-Varley Cemetery (also known as Sterlingville-Catholic Cemetery and St Marys Cemetery), originally in the Town of Philadelphia now part of Ft Drum, has been fully inventoried and updates posted. This cemetery was originally associated with St Mary's Catholic Church in the Village of Sterlingville, Town of Philadelphia, Jefferson County, NY. As a result of the 1941 expansion of Pine Camp, this cemetery is now part of Fort Drum.

May 28
On Memorial Day both cemeteries at Sterlingville, Fort Drum were fully inventoried. Burials for Sterlingville Cemetery (also known as Sterlingville-Protestant Cemetery and Gates Cemetery) have been updated. Photos for Sterlingville-Catholic Cemetery, which we believe is St Mary's Cemetery, are currently being reviewed and the results of the review should be online shortly. Evans Mills Old Cemetery has been updated based on continued photo review.

May 27
The site and all of the databases that support it have undergone a complete revision. The most significant change has been to the databases, now referred to as collections.  They have been totally restructured to provide greater detail and more closely aligns with our internal structure.

The following is the status for all of the collections (databases):
- Burials: Completely converted and all data on line
- Deaths: Approximately 30% have been converted, old data removed, more detail to include source
- Marriages: Approximately 10% converted, old data still online, more detail to include source for those entries converted
- Births: Not online. Data is currently being converted
- Baptisms: Not online. Data is currently being converted
- Patriot War of 1837: Completely converted
- Ft Drum Expansion (1941): Completely converted
- Cemetery Descriptions: Completely converted. Additional detail is provided.
- Census: Completely converted with all data online
- Directories (UAB, Business Directories, 1918 Farm): Completely converted and all data online
- Civil War: Online. No change in format or level of detail

The following items are either currently not online or are not working correctly:
Surname Search: Currently not available. Implementation pending completion of Births and Baptisims
Cemetery Art: Although available, data did not post correctly. Working on issue
Postcards: Implementation pending completion of photo conversions.

May 23 Update of the site is slightly delayed. Due to the expansion of all the data files that drive most of the collections (i.e. Deaths, Marriages, etc.) it is taking quite a bit longer to get the data files loaded. Because of the problems encountered, we may not be able to have all of the new collections (births, baptisms, cemetery art, post cards, and surname search) immediately available. Once we are confident that the site is working, then we gradually implement the new features. We sincerely appreciate your patience.

May 14
Major update to Dexter Cemetery, Town of Brownville. Of the roughly 5,000 burials in this cemetery, over 3,600 now have photos available.

Augsbury Cemetery was visited and fully inventoried. The burials for Adam Flath Cemetery and Augsbury Cemetery, both in the Town of Pamelia, have been posted.

May 4
Review of Burials continues. The full Burial Database has been completely reloaded as a result of this review. Significant updates have been posted to the following cemeteries:
- Brookside Cemetery, Town of Watertown
- Parrish Cemetery, Town of Pamelia
- Sulphur Springs Cemetery, Town of Hounsfield

Adam Flath Cemetery has been added to the burials as this cemetery was revisited and three burials have been identified. This cemetery is essentially destroyed and the headstones are no longer present.

Two cemeteries that were previously believe to have been lost have been located. As both are on private property, we're currently working with the owners to gain permission to visit them once the weather cooperates.

The redesign of the site has been slightly delayed as all the databases are undergoing a full redesign so that more information can be presented on the site.

April 4
The Union Academy at Belleville collection has been updated to include class rosters for the term years 1893-1894 and 1911-1912. With this addition there are now 1,717 students in this collection. We continue to search for additional school rosters, especially for classes prior to 1860.

Updates to the site are being delayed due to issues with the software that we use to maintain the site. The result of these issues is we can only update existing pages and can not add any new content. These issues have not impacted on updates to any of the databases. Consequently we continue to post updates to burials. A prerelease version of the remake of the site is nearly complete and hope to have it online within the next week.

March 8
The 1863 Directory for Watertown, North Watertown, and Juhelville has been added to the site. This collection contains information on approximately 2,400 individuals and businesses located with those three areas for the period 1863-1864.

We’ve recently acquired copies of two more class years (1893 and 1911-1912) for the Union Academy at Belleville. Rosters for those two years should be online within the next week.

March 2
Updated the Union Academy collection to reflect course information on individual students. Additional students have been identified in several class years. Consequently the student counts on the main UAB page are no longer accurate. The additional students are those that were only enrolled for a single course such as piano. Unfortunately for many of the years the documentation we had access to wasn’t complete, so we don’t have course data for many of the students. We are searching for a source for that information.

 March 1
The first installment of student rosters for the Union Academy at Belleville is now available. The student rosters can be reviewed by graduates and class years. A surname search feature is currently not available but should be available in the next update. Two additional class rosters have been obtained, one pre-1900 and one post-1900, however the information from those rosters is currently not available with this update. Ideally they’ll be transcribed in time for the next major update.

We have still be unable to locate any rosters for the pre-1860 era. We would sincerely appreciate any information that would assist in locating information on classes prior to 1860 .

Along with the addition of the UAB rosters, the site has been completely reloaded. Although everything appears to be working correctly, if you notice any pages not working correctly please let us know.

February 27
Phase I of the 1918 Farm Directory is now complete. This collection contains approximately 7,500 individuals / families from Jefferson and Lewis Counties involved in farming. The next phase will consist of adding maps to provide a general location for each of the farms.

The Union Academy at Belleville is nearly complete and should be online prior to the end of the week.

Review of cemetery photographs continues and updates have been posted to cemeteries in the Towns of Adams, Clayton, Orleans and Hounsfield.

February 18
The 1918 Farm Directory is nearing completion. The Lewis County portion is now complete through surnames beginning with the letter R.

Class rosters for the Union Academy at Belleville are that we’ve had access to are now complete and should be online by the end of the month. We are in dire need of UAB class rosters for the period prior to 1860. We also have huge gaps between 1860 and 1865, 1866-1875, 1875-1886, 1887-1896, 1896-1898, and most dates after 1898.

Numerous updates have been posted to the Deaths database and to Rural Cemetery (aka. Adams Rural Cemetery). Work continues on photos taken last summer and minor updates to the Burial database is being made on a daily basis.

The site is currently undergoing a complete revision and we hope to have a beta version of the site available within the next couple of weeks. We are attempting to incorporate many of the suggestions we’ve received over the last year. This is the first major revision of the site in over three years and our aim is to significantly improve its usability. Several areas will be completely revised to provide more detailed information as well as source information.

January 30
The Links page has been updated with numerous new entries in Jefferson County. A section of U. S. National Sites has been added along with entries for New York general sites. The Jefferson County portion will continue grow as we obtain permission to link the site.

January 25
The 1918 Farm Directory has been updated with Lewis County surnames beginning with letters H through O.

January 20
Lutheran Cemetery, Town of Clayton has been updated. This cemetery has approximately 151 burials of which 111 have been photographically confirmed. A revisit to this cemetery is planned for the spring.

January 17
The 1918 Farm Directory has been updated with the addition of surnames beginning with the letters A through G for Lewis County. It is anticipated that the Lewis County portion will be completed by the end of the month.

Work continues on cemetery photographs taken last summer. We are currently working on Lutheran Cemetery, Town of Clayton and should have the results posted within a week.

We currently have access to class rosters for school years: 1860, 1865-1866, 1875, 1886-1887, 1896, 1898, 1900, and 1902 for the Union Academy of Belleville and should have those rosters online within the next 14 days. We have been unable to find any class rosters prior to 1860; however, we do have access to a list of most of the graduates for the majority of school years. We would sincerely appreciate any assistance in locating class rosters for the missing school terms, especially for any prior to 1860.

January 10
Updates were posted to burials in the following cemeteries:
- Sunnyside Cemetery, Town of Champion, Jefferson County
- Walton Street Cemetery, Town of Alexandria, Jefferson County
- Wells Cemetery, Town of Lyme, Jefferson County
- Wood Family Cemetery, Town of Rodman, Jefferson County
- Woodville Cemetery, Town of Ellisburg, Jefferson County