An early project was walking the 2 Walnut cemeteries, Lincoln Township Cemetery and Monroe Township Cemetery, reading the inscriptions on the tombstones and recording our findings. Then, we started collecting obituaries for everyone that we could find in the Walnut Bureau microfilm. Obituaries have been clipped and saved from several area newspapers. We have been gifted obituary collections from many different people. We file these in our obituary notebooks that are organized by cemetery. Currently we are improving the Layton Township Cemetery notebooks and indexing them.
Memorial pages for people buried at the Layton Township Cemetery, St. Patrick’s Catholic Cemetery, Lincoln Township Cemetery and Oakhill Cemetery east of Hancock have been added to findagrave.com. Photos of their tombstones have also been added. We receive numerous requests for edits of the memorials and to link them to other relatives. This involves researching to prove the accuracy of the requests.
Another project was photographing the business buildings and homes in Walnut. We have recorded ownership and residents through the years in many notebooks of information.
Throughout the 25 years, we have answered many queries from people whose family lived here. When we can help someone find anything on their family, we feel very good about what we are all about.
We have scanned all three books of cemetery lot deeds for the Layton Township Cemetery and made indexes. Jim Hansen spent many hours creating a new map with the lot owners at Layton Township Cemetery. Gayle and Leo Stuart worked on a map of the Catholic Cemetery. We have a more detailed database of the burials at both Walnut cemeteries, thanks to the work of Erika Lees.
We scanned the Walnut Peace Church records, which include the German Lutheran Church records, and made a database index. We also have a database of the Presbyterian Church records.
We made an index of two birth certificate notebooks and an index of three obituary notebooks.
WGS had nice shelves and cabinets built in the genealogy room. We have 2 desktop computers, a laptop and a printer/copier, which we can use to help you explore your family history with access to various genealogy research sites.
Thanks to the Walnut Library for getting the Walnut newspapers online at advantage-preservation.com.
ITEMS FOR SALE
1) Hard-bound copies of Walnut, Iowa, A Walk Down Memory Lane 1871-1996
authored by the Walnut Quasqui Book Committee – $10 each
2) Spiral-bound 175-page publication of Lincoln Township Cemetery
by Barbara Haller Butcher and Karen Karstens Hansen – $20 each
3) Antique City Roots, the WGS Newsletters – $2 each
Subject to Availability, Plus the Cost of Shipping
KH