100-Year Old Churches

This Old Church definitely makes its way into my Top 10 favorite categories (along with The Holocaust, Lucky 7, American Civil War Monuments and Memorials, U.S. National Register of Historic Places, Photos Then and Now, NRHP Historic Districts - Contributing Buildings, Zippy the Pinhead, American Guide Series & Lincoln Highway with an honorable mention to Roadside Attractions). Something about these old places of worship brings out the history sleuth in me. I have gone to great length to recover the history of the various churches I have posted, although sometimes I have been unsuccessful.

Finding these old churches also gives me an opportunity to cross post. I look for everything possible and I am sure I always miss something. The big ones I look for are the bell towers, the front doors, crosses, cemeteries, historic markers and signs, NRHP/contributing, specific religious denomination category, Photos Then & Now, spire/benchmarks, stained glass, gates and cornerstones. I usually can get a Lucky 7 from the older churches I visit.

I recently noticed BruceS reached 300 submissions for the This Old Church category as well as yours truly reaching 100. Nice!! So, I got to thinking, who are the main contributors for this category? I did a query. So, here is a list of the leading submitters for the category.

• BruceS 300
• Math Teacher 101
• Marine Biologist 75
• flipflopnick 61
• Norfolk12 84
• silverquill 140
• Brentorboxer 95
• onfire4jesus 40

Happiness is Hometown Waymarking

One of my favorite things about waymarking is when I have an opportunity to 'show off' a favorite part of my time using a waymark as a forum. Invariably this leads to the creation of a waymark which I like to call one of my favorites. I have constructed about four of these which fall into that category. My favorite part of the favorites is the inclusion of a personal narrative which lends a first hand flavor to the site. Sometimes, a first hand narrative can make a waymark especially meaningful and potentially useful to someone in the future seeking information on a specific site. History is recorded by writing to communicate a perspective (supposedly factual) about a place, time or event. I try to treat those personal waymarks like I am an amateur historian documenting a place for future generations to learn about. I know it sounds corny, but that's me!

I wanted to share four places with you, but one place in particular. We have an old meeting house near me called Cropwell Friends Meeting. It was built in 1793 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1992. I managed to write 9 waymarks for the site. It is still active today and I have attended Meeting for Worship there a few times. I grew up about a mile from this site and never appreciated its history, importance or beauty until waymarking. Cropwell Meeting recently celebrated a 200 year anniversary of their meetinghouse. I attended this gala for a very specific reason, besides to celebrate with the community. I had in my possession a picture from the 100 year anniversary celebration in 1909. I had a mission: Tale a picture from the same exact spot in 2009 for the 200 year celebration. Mission successful! I created one of my favorite waymarks as a Photos Then and Now submission. Check out the picture below:


The pictures may not look like they were taken from the same location but trust me, I got it town to the square inch. The actual waymark can be found HERE.

My other favorites probably only interest me. If you are curious they can be found HERE, HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE.

I would really like to hear from some of you about your favorites you have posted or something you created which particularly makes you proud. I would love to post it here! Thanks and keep on waymarking!

Eric