Groundspeak Portal

I was sifting through findagrave.com and noticed that there's quite a few U.S. Congressmen buried around here. I wouldn't consider most of them as famous but then again I'm not into politics all that much. Maybe a category on people who have held a public office or would they all be considered "famous"? Swizzle

does that category not have a stipulation about having a wiki article?

have you looked for them there? thats the criteria i tend to use--if they are famous enought to have an article about them.....

the cat also tends to accept 'local' famousness as well....

We're fairly flexible in that category. It's our way of handling the subjective nature of the word 'famous'.

I'm not sure we'd allow a grave of some for simply having been a member of congress, especially if they only served for a short time or if there was no other general information available about them. We don't have a wiki article stipulation, but most of the submittals we get for political figures have additional web based articles that are easy to locate (and almost all of them have some type of wikipedia entry).

As stated in the category description, we do require that "the individual whose gravesite location is being recorded must be widely recognized, rather than just locally known". The general criteria is that if we can easily find additional supportive information about the individual, and we can see how the person could have been considered 'famous' at some point in their life outside of their immediate local community, we generally accept the waymark.

So as long as I can dig up some dirt on these politicians then a simple posted website with some info about at least accomplishment would count? What about those who did nothing? I knew there would be a lot of gray area on this one because of the more famous politicians. I think this would be just the extra subjectiveness that all of you reviewers have grown to love. So I guess we can bury the political graveyard idea? Swizzle

cache_test_dummies was actually the officer who approved my waymark for the final resting place of former Florida Governor Albert Waller Gilchrist into the Grave of a Famous Person category... which I need to update with an original and more indepth description of his life that I'd written elsewhere to replace that cheap wikipedia quote with bad html.

Ah hell, might as well do it now. (So if it looks fine when you see the waymark, ignore what I wrote after the "...")

swizzle:

So as long as I can dig up some dirt on these politicians then a simple posted website with some info about at least accomplishment would count?

Well, the information that can be obtained for the individual will still have to demonstrate that the person meets (or likely met at some point) the "widely recognized, rather than just locally known" qualifier.

Just having been involved in politics by itself wouldn't automatically qualify anyone for this category. For example, someone who served at a fairly local level (like a couple of terms as a state representative, or a mayor of a small city), or someone who served a single uneventful term in Congress, with not much else in their life to show for it, would likely not qualify.

swizzle:

What about those who did nothing?

Well, if they did nothing, why would they be considered (by you, or me, or anyone else) to be 'famous'? We are, after all, looking for arguably famous people.

Redneck Parrotheads' Albert Waller Gilchrist example is a good one. I was not remotely familiar with Governor Gilchrist, but clearly the information I could easily obtain about him from various sources made it seem extremely likely that he would have been well known during his day (Florida State Representative, a Brigadier General in the state militia, a Captain in the US Army, Governor of Florida ...).

swizzle:

So I guess we can bury the political graveyard idea? Swizzle

'Bury the political graveyard' - cute!

But it's up to you whether or not you want to pursue a category for gravestones of politicians. I was only trying to address questions about what it might take for a political figure to qualify for the Grave of a Famous Person category.

cache_test_dummies:

swizzle:

What about those who did nothing?

Well, if they did nothing, why would they be considered (by you, or me, or anyone else) to be 'famous'? We are, after all, looking for arguably famous people.

Does this mean you will be leaving out Paris Hilton when she finally goes? Oh wait she is famous because of the nothing. The famous for being famous conundrum.

Well, I guess I'll look up all of the U.S, Congressmen that we have around here and see if they are worth posting or not. I have a feeling that a few of the local garbage men of their time were probably more famous then they were. I guess you never know until you hit enter after typing in their name. Swizzle

TheBeanTeam:

Does this mean you will be leaving out Paris Hilton when she finally goes? Oh wait she is famous because of the nothing. The famous for being famous conundrum.

You make me laugh, but of course, you are correct - it is entirely possible to be famous without having done anything specific. Some people are famous as the result of something that happened to them (the Lindbergh baby, Crispus Attucks ...).

Now if you'll excuse me, I really need to get back to work on my "All Things Paris Hilton" category proposal. I don't expect the category to pass peer review, but I'm really looking forward to reading the voter comments.

There is website dedicated to the burial sites of former politicians and it is call you guessed it The Political Graveyard.

Yeah I saw that one too after I had already typed in the other websites name. That would be a good way to knock the subjective out of the category. If they aren't listed in thepoliticalgraveyard.com then they don't belong in the category. That seems pretty black and white to me if anyone wants to start up this category or at least try to. Swizzle

My nerves got a bit singed the last time I created a cemetery-related category so I won't stick my neck out again but if it's written to describe what we're supposed to waymark, I'd vote for it.

I'd vote for it too. What the heck. I'd rather be the co-pilot on a few missions before I try to crash land my own plane. Swizzle

I would be interested in this category... for some reason waymarking has drug me into more than one graveyard.

How far would this go?  Federal level?  State?  Local?

It would go for anyone who is on the political graveyard site. It would have to include all of them or the subjective nature would be a true killjoy. I'd like to see this one fly but I'm not that great at doing the write ups. Feel free to steal the idea or find some others to help you put it together. Silverquill might be willing to help with the write up. I'd be more then happy to help with the reviewing process. Swizzle

swizzle:

It would go for anyone who is on the political graveyard site. It would have to include all of them or the subjective nature would be a true killjoy. I'd like to see this one fly but I'm not that great at doing the write ups. Feel free to steal the idea or find some others to help you put it together. Silverquill might be willing to help with the write up. I'd be more then happy to help with the reviewing process. Swizzle

Okay, the group Political Grave Diggers is on open enrollment. 

You've got the first invitation.

Since we'd already talked about this, my offer still stands, and I'll work on it as soon as I can.  I've got an all-day conference tomorrow, so it may be a few days.

Stay tuned!

No rush. I'm sure they'll still be there waiting to be waymarked. I think there should be a strong effort by all of the waymarkers in this category to find something about each individual for the long description. Either good or bad, I'd like to read more then, "Here he is and he was a U.S.Congressman." I think some are going to be pretty tough to find anything on but others have some pretty good history. The U.S.Congressmen that resides in our local cemetery didn't last long in congress but he does have something worth noting. He was doing his own undercover investigation of the conditions of a local prison and disguised himself and got arrested to see the conditions himself firsthand. There's got to be some pretty amazing stories attached to some of these guys. Swizzle

swizzle:

I think there should be a strong effort by all of the waymarkers in this category to find something about each individual for the long description. Either good or bad, I'd like to read more then, "Here he is and he was a U.S.Congressman." I think some are going to be pretty tough to find anything on but others have some pretty good history. The U.S.Congressmen that resides in our local cemetery didn't last long in congress but he does have something worth noting. He was doing his own undercover investigation of the conditions of a local prison and disguised himself and got arrested to see the conditions himself firsthand. There's got to be some pretty amazing stories attached to some of these guys. Swizzle

I like a good story... this is something that I can get behind.