Field Activity #3: Creation of a GIS for Hadleyville Cemetery using field data

Introduction 

The Hadleyville Cemetery is located in Eau Claire County off of County Road HH. This cemetery contains 120 lots with burials dated back to 1865 and is a total of 1.5 acres. The major challenge faced for the county is the lack of original records and maps of the cemetery. Other issues include the chemical weathering that has occurred to multiple gravestones, the removal of gravestones, and destruction to a large portion of multiple stones. Lack of identifying markings of grave sites is a major issue in the cemetery and creates a risk of disturbing a grave during a future burial. The overall goal of this project is to use various geospatial techniques to accurately map out the cemetery, particularly the occupied grave sites and create a detailed spreadsheet of important information regarding each grave.

The reason this will not just be a simple map or spreadsheet is because there is a lot of other information that should be known regarding the graves. Information can be stored in GIS and tied to a specific location and feature (in this case the feature is the grave sites) and used by management of the cemetery. This information will help in record keeping and buying and selling of plots within the Hadleyville Cemetery. As mentioned, the issues with the cemetery are mainly due to the lack of record and information about each grave. Applying attributes, such as name, date, and condition of gravestone will help solve this problem.

Information needed would be a highly accurate survey grade GPS system. The accuracy is important because the scale of the area is not very large and therefore accurate locations are critical to ensure that issues do not arise (such as the buying and selling of occupied graves or the accidental exhumation of a body). GPS combined with the study of aerial imagery of the area will allow the gravestones and obvious graves to be accurately mapped. As mentioned, a major issue is the absence or destruction of headstones.

Overall, the objective of using GPS along with aerial imagery would be to georeference the aerial image and locate the grave sites based on the image. Using the GPS, we would then be able to just upload the points into GIS and not have to manually place the grave site locations.

Study Area

As mentioned, the Hadleyville Cemetery is located in the city of Eleva, just south of Eau Claire, off of County Road HH (Figure 1). Overall, the cemetery has been maintained except the issue of the destruction of gravestones. This allowed for adequate data collection with the UAV imagery. The data was collected in the late summer and therefore the southwest and southeast corner of the cemetery has a large canopy covering several gravestones. This would not have been as much of an issue if the data was collected in the late fall but that was not the case. Initially the data was collected around 3:00pm which led to a large amount of shadow cast by the gravestone and surrounding trees. Data was then collected around noon the second time. This imagery was used in the map-making process. 

Figure 1: Hadleyville Cemetery location

Methods

As a class, we used various geospatial tools to mark the locations of grave sites. These tools include a survey grade GPS to pinpoint the exact location of the grave sites within the cemetery which allows for precise locations. Another tool used was a UAS (unmanned aerial system) drone. With this technology, the entirety of the cemetery was imaged. The accuracy of the GPS unit was very important due to the small area in question. However, the time allotted to data collection was limited and therefore created an issue. To solve this issue, a UAS was used to capture imagery of the cemetery. Other information necessary to create an accurate database was collected as well. Before collecting data in the field, a set of attributes for each grave site was determined. As a class, these attributes were put into a normalized excel sheet (figure2). The data was collected on pen and paper because it was more efficient. Information collected about the cemetery included first and foremost whether or not the grave stone was legible. Depending on the answer, the rest of the information was collect. This data included last and first name along with a middle initial,  year of birth and year of death, if the statue was standing (if left blank it indicates that the stone was flat and in the ground purposefully), type of stone (marker type), whether is was a joint tombstone and number of people, and finally any additional notes. The PointID field was determined based on the layout which is explained further on.  This data was then uploaded into an excel sheet on GoogleDocs. By putting these attributes into an excel a potential table join could be made within ArcMap. This means that all of the class data was formatted the same. While in the field, the cemetery was split up into lines in order to ensure that all areas were collected(Figure 3).

Figure 2: Excel sheet showing the normalized data collected by class

Figure 3: Hadleyville class grid pattern

Using ArcMap, the aerial imagery was manually analyzed and each grave was digitized. To do so, the Hadleyville imagery was uploaded to a geodatabase within ArcMap. The geodatabase, jackiecemetery, was a file geodatabase created for this project only. After the Phantom image (RGB bands 3,2,1) was imported, digitizing of the gravestones had to be done. Creating a new feature class within the geodatabase allowed for a new layer to be created and edited. The feature class, Graves, was added to the geodatabase and given the same projection as the image was uploaded with and editing began. The feature type selected was point. Within each point, two fields were created. One field was the PointID (text type) and the second was Image (raster type). The PointID for each grave had to match the PointID within the excel spreadsheet. By doing so, a table join was created and all of the other information regarding the specific graves were added to the attribute table within ArcMap. This saved time by uploading the information at once rather than each field by each grave. Also seen in the image was ground control points. These had to be digitized as well to ensure no confusion by viewers. The same process was followed.

Results/Discussion

The newly formatted data allowed for a table join which saved a lot of time in the map-making process within ArcMap. Performing a table join resulted in all of the data within the excel sheet to be added as attributes within ArcMap. The table join conducted was done so by the use of the common field "PointID". The extra attribute created titled image portrays that there was an attachment of an raster. This field holds the image of the gravestone embedded in the map. 

Figure 4: Attribute table from ArcMap showing a table join was completed

The PointID attribute is important for both the location and the connected attributes. The following map was created to show the location of each grave stone (Map1). As seen, the map closely resembles figure3 which can be found in the methods.

Map 1: Indicates the PointID for each grave

Another important attribute was the Last Name. this is important to know when dealing with families wanting to be buried together. Map 2 shows the last name of the individual buried at each specific grave site. As seen, many families have already began to be laid to rest in clusters together. 

Map 2: Map showing the last names of the individuals buried at each location

In many cases, the amount of individuals within a certain cemetery is misinterpreted based on the number of tombstones that are visual. However, with high costs for tombstones, it is becoming more popular to share on tombstone for several people. This not only ensures that the individuals are buried near each other but it also saves surface space within the cemetery and leaves room for more family members to be buried nearby as well. Map 3 indicates the 

Map 3: Map showing the location of the joint tombstones

Despite the success of the maps and the table join, there are many possible errors that may have occurred. For starters, human error is often likely when the work is split up. At the beginning of the project the class was at a loss on how to begin, how to split the cemetery into sections and label them. In the end, data was collected for the same graves several times and had to be filtered out. Another possible error occurs where there are tree coverage. The placement of the graves are estimates of the actual location. This can cause issues in the future because of the importance on the accurate locations of all of the graves. Discussing how to enter the project and set up data should have been determined prior to heading into the field which would have saved the step and stress of then figuring out all of the notes later on after familiarity of the project decreased. The issue regarding the survey grade GPS should have been thought of prior to wasting large amounts of the data collection time trying to 1)figure out the system though the experience was useful and 2) triangulate under cover. Several members of the class ended up having to return to the site to collect the remaining needed data.

Conclusion

The methods of this project allow for the completion of an accurate map containing pertinent information regarding the cemetery. through the use of GIS, GPS, and aerial imagery locations of grave sites can be mapped. This work can help future management of the cemetery and provide historic record of the area. Because the class collaborated, the majority of us had a similar format for how to collect data. However, there was a large amount of frustration toward the beginning while deciding the best way to go about note taking and formatting. Overall, the project provided the cemetery management with accurate location and information necessary for the cemetery records. The location of the grave stones are highly accurate and should provide valid coordinates of  inhabited graves.