Find Location-Based Photos at Panoramio

Whenever I discover ancestors living in a new city or town, one of the first things I like to do is dig up a few photos and some history of the place. While pictures of cities, towns and other places are easy to find on popular photo-sharing sites such as Flickr, the first place I usually turn to is Panoramio, a Web site that links millions of photos with the exact geographical location where they were taken. These photos are all uploaded by users, and I find it especially useful for locating photos of places near my chosen location which might not have otherwise turned up with a search for the city or town. Some of the uploaded photographs are even historical, such as this 1955 photo of my mother-in-law's home city of Berlichingen, Germany. You can also explore cemeteries in Panoramio, although the ones most often photographed are the famous ones like London's Highgate cemetery. I'll have to do something about uploading photos of some of those rural North Carolina cornfield cemeteries they are missing!

Photos from Panoramio can also be accessed from Google Maps. After typing in a place name in Google Maps, you will see a "More info about" button near the bottom of the left-hand navigation window. Click on the "more info about" button and you will be presented with a display of photos and videos that are geotagged for your chosen location, with images populated from the Panoramio Web site and videos from YouTube.

Happy exploring! Or maybe consider uploading a few photos of your own to help the next researcher to come along...