Photographing & Working With Headstones

Generally, transcribing info in genealogy makes us prone to making errors and perpetuating them, or changing information over time like a modern game of "telephone" where each repetition of the message changes what was originally said until the original is lost.   This is why scanning and photography - especially of headstones - is so valuable.  We capture the original information that is present.

Headstones are particularly valuable because the amount of work and checking that goes into the information on them is generally a bit more extensive than other sources.

( IF you have the right person.  IF they have a headstone.  IF you know where they are buried. )

Sometimes headstones only contain nominal information (initials, "Baby Hollinger") but when combined with cemetery records, obituaries, death certificates and the likes, they provide tangible "proof" that is less susceptible to error than documents and are a valuable resource to genealogy.


A suggestion when you go to a cemetery.  GO PREPARED!

1.  Buy a 1 gallon weed-killer sprayer.  You can get them at Wal-Mart for about $10.  You want the kind that will pressurize.  Mark it "WATER ONLY.  FOR TOMBSTONE CLEANING", so you will not accidentally use it for fertilizer or other chemicals.

2. Stiff bristle brush, NYLON.  The same kind you would use to clean your carpet.

3.  Shaving cream.  Cheapest kind, without gels and colognes in it.

4.  Squeegee  The rubber kind.  You want it to be flexible not stiff plastic.

5.  4-5 gallons of water (milk jugs with the screw on caps work well).

6. Camera with batteries, spare batteries, film, spare film or empty memory chip.

7.  Garden hand shovel – sturdy – able to lift small buried headstones and grave markers or able to shovel dirt off the edges or cut back the sod that overgrows the headstones.

8.  Manual grass clippers (heck - bring a gas-powered weedwhacker if you want to but it can be a bit unwieldy and draw unwanted attention or interrupt funerals).  This is for trimming back grass from the edge of a headstone for photographing it.

9. Weed fork hand tool – used for probing for buried headstones that aren't visible anymore or finding the edges that you can't see anymore or....pulling up weeds!.   

10.  Small tarp or sheet of plastic if you don't want to kneel in the dirt.

11. Five gallon bucket for carrying everything in.

(Additionally, if you wish to go beyond simply scrubbing a wet headstone, there is D2 Headstone Cleaner which can clean and preserve a headstone over time.  Instructions on how to use it can be found HERE. )

Take a photo before you even begin doing any work on the headstone, and then take a photo after every individual step in the event that one stage may provide a better photo than a further stage.  I've had headstones that I obtained better photos of as they were originally, than compared to after I cleaned them off. 

Brush off any dirt or mud using your hand or a brush. If the tombstone looks like it might be hard to read, mist it with water.  This sometimes is the only thing needed to make the information readable on the camera.

If misting it with water doesn't look sufficient, squeeze a SMALL amount of shaving cream on either the tombstone on the back of the squeegee and spread it on the tombstone.  Using the back of the squeegee helps keep the shaving cream from piling up on the gravestone.  This can help you see what is engraved on the tombstone for photographing.

Take a picture! (Step 1 – get close.  Step 2 – get closer! Step 3 – get closer! Step 4 – take picture! Step 5 – step back)  Later on, download the picture and file it and label it so you can find it!


Photographing headstones with the sun shining right on them can diminish the usefulness of the photos depending on how the stone is carved.   Additionally, being partially shadowed by trees can make reading a stone difficult.

Depending on the arrangements you may want to wait a while and allow the light to change before taking a photo for documentation purposes. Sometimes you may just want to do it on a different day.  Keep your shadow off the stone if you can.


After taking the picture of the tombstone, the shaving cream must be COMPLETELY WASHED OFF.  It will take less water if you brush it a little with the brush and then use the sprayer to wash it off.

It is very important to not leave the shaving cream on the tombstone.  Over a very short time it will attract particles from the air that will damage the stone.  That is why the pressurized sprayer comes in handy.  If use jugs of water to wash it off, it could take several gallons.  By using the sprayer, you can clean 5-10 stones with only a gallon of water.  There is enough pressure to clean off the cream but not enough to hurt most stones.

Under NO circumstances do you use bleach, flour, corn meal or any kind of acid on the stone. 

.