Genealogist shares tips on how to unearth, preserve stories

August 25, 2011 at 5:00 a.m. | Updated August 25, 2011 at 5:00 a.m.

Carole Boggins demonstrates ways to read the information on the headstones or markers where it is barely legible. Here, she uses shaving cream to fill the engravings on this head stone.
Carole Boggins demonstrates ways to read the information on the headstones or markers where it is barely legible. Here, she uses shaving cream to fill the engravings on this head stone.

Names, dates, symbols and monuments are familiar to Phyllis Erhart, who visits Riverview Cemetery where her parents, both pairs of grandparents and a great-grandparent couple all are buried.

But she was delighted Wednesday to try out a specialized blue-paper rubbing technique, included in the History Talks program Wednesday hosted at Riverview Cemetery.

Carole Goggin, a full-time genealogist and researcher with the Jefferson County Historical Society, shared her grave-hunting clues and her methods of preservation recording with about a dozen guests.

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