Just in the last couple of days, I have created a new version of my web
site, The Political Graveyard, http://PoliticalGraveyard.com

When I created the site, more than six years ago, I envisioned an audience
maybe in the dozens: a few political junkies perhaps.  Maybe someone
writing up a tour for a historic cemetery, who might not otherwise know
that an obscure grave in the back corner is of a U.S. Senator.  So I was
more than a bit surprised at the crowds of people who eventually showed up
on my electronic doorstep: one to two million page views per month.

Anyway, partly motivated by all the flattering attention for my little
project, I have steadily built and expanded it.  The new version, opened
this week, lists over 107,000 politicians (compared with about 81,000 in
the last one), and introduces a number of new features:

    * Politicians Portrayed on Money -- U.S. or Confederate coins or
    currency.  It is ironic that Andrew Jackson, lifelong foe of paper
    money, has his visage printed on so much of it these days -- but that
    practice started less than 20 years after his death.  Jackson is one
    of only two political figures (George Washington is the other) whose
    portraits have appeared both on U.S. and Confederate bills.
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/special/coins-currency.html

    * Politicians Who Were (or took part in a) First.  Many of these are
    politico-demographic milestones (the first woman, the first Catholic,
    the first Republican, the first black, the first Chinese-American,
    etc.).  Quite a few of the rest are accomplishments of politicians in
    other fields: the builder of the first flax mill in America, author of
    the first book about American law, captain of the first U.S. war
    vessel to carry the Stars and Stripes into battle, and so on.
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/special/first.html

    * Gay or Lesbian Politicians, with 31 listed: Barney Frank and Tammy
    Baldwin and Jim Kolbe and Gerry Studds and more than two dozen others.
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/group/gay-lesbian.html

    * There are a bunch of additional organizations for which I have
    (incomplete) lists of politician members, including the American
    Dental Association and the once-mighty Anti-Saloon League.  But the
    Freemasons continue to lead the list, with 2,294 politician members.
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/group/am-dental-assoc.html
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/group/anti-saloon-league.html
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/group/masons.html

    * The Politicians Named for Other Politicians page is back.  George
    Washington has the most pols named for him (84), followed distantly by
    Benjamin Franklin (46), Thomas Jefferson (35), Andrew Jackson (28),
    Henry Clay (20), and 53 others, including such unlikely heroes as
    Roscoe Conkling, Franklin Pierce, Chester A. Arthur, and Millard
    Fillmore.
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/special/pols-named-for-pols-index.html

    * The Political Families list has been expanded.  The threshold for
    including a family has been reduced from four politician members to
    three, and each family now gets a separate page with full information
    about all members.  Of particular interest are the Adams, Roosevelt,
    Taft, and Kennedy families, but there are more than four hundred
    others both famous and obscure.
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/families/index.html
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/families/1001.html (Adams)
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/families/1196.html (Roosevelt)
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/families/1335.html (Taft)
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/families/1427.html (Kennedy)

    * I already had a page for each of the more than 3,000 counties in the
    U.S., listing politicians who were born, lived, died, or buried in
    that area.  For example, here's the page on Schenectady County, N.Y.
    http://politicalgraveyard.com/geo/NY/SC.html

    The heads of those pages now have more links relevant to that
    particular county, including the county's official web site if
    available.  And now for the first time I'm treating Alaska's boroughs
    and census areas as counties, giving each its own page, even though
    some are conspicuously lacking in politician data.

    * Entries for some politicians now feature links to biographies and
    histories about them at Amazon.com.  Naturally, any actual book sales
    that result will generate a small kickback to me.  Not enough,
    unfortunately, to let me quit my day job and work on the web site full
    time.

The popup ads, which were NOT my idea, are supposed to go away by
tomorrow.  If they didn't annoy me so much, I'd be temped to say: hey,
even the hoary, dignified New York Times web site has popup ads now.  They
do generate about an extra $10/day.  But I can't stand them.

I hope people have as much fun browsing The Political Graveyard as I have
putting it together!

                               Larry

---
Lawrence Kestenbaum, [log in to unmask]
The Political Graveyard, http://politicalgraveyard.com
Mailing address: P.O. Box 2563, Ann Arbor MI 48106

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