This site is moving, help move it

After seven years, Geomyidae is finding a new home at Placeography.org. I now work for the Minnesota Historical Society as a web designer/developer. As part of my job I am help to create a house history wiki. So not only will all the data and photos from here be moved over, as a wiki, anyone that registers will be able to contribute as well. Enjoy!

I like this site, but I have had request after request to add information or add someone's house. I simply do not have the time to keep it up. It seems to me to be no brainer for this site to move to a wiki so people can add their own information.

All the photos from this site have been added but the text needs to be hand entered. Besides, we are looking for volunteers to help develop placeography.

I will be keeping site site up for at least through 2008. After then who knows....?

What does the name geomyidae stand for?

Geomyidae is the latin name for the Pocket Gopher, the Official Mascot of Minnesota. Although there is some debate about that, because the critter depicted in paintings at the State Capitol and for years illustrated at the University of Minnesota (who should have known their gophers mind you!) is actually the 13-lined ground squirrel (Citellus tridecemlineatus). It is still a rodent though...

Who runs this site and why?

This site created and is run by me, Joe Hoover, who basically does it all here. I was inspired by the Phototour of Minneapolis site created by Chris Gregerson. Like his site, this site is a completely voluntary effort.

Since my job is creating web sites as well as teaching web design, I felt the need to do a home page. However I was very aware of the huge volume of bandwidth waste on the net and I was determined to do a site that would provide at least moderately interesting content.

This site also provides me with a chance to tryout new skills and learn a thing or two in the process. Specifically, for me, it is learning about PHP and SQL and the fun-n-fascinating world of creating and designing around data bases. This is also an attempt on my part to learn linux and run an apache web server.

Where do you find the history on these houses?

Much of the history on the individual structures comes from a massive historic site survey done by the Ramsey County Historical Society and the St. Paul Heritage Preservation Commission in the early 1980's which recorded as many historical and architectural significant sites as they could. Much of there data was gathered going over city directories and permits and numerous other documents, saving me countless hours of work. If you get the chance go visit the Ramsey County Historical Society in the Landmark Center on Rice Park. They're a nice group of people.

Other information on specific neighborhoods comes from books. Irvine Park history was tastefully lifted from "A Brief History of The Irvine Park District" Published by The Historic Irvine Park Association. And much of that research was done the professional house detective, Jim Sazevich. I've had the honor of going on a house hunt with him and all I can say is what would have taken me hours (or even days -- and I know my research mind you!) took Jim a matter of an hour!

How is this site organized

For those of you unfamiliar with St. Paul the site is organized around St. Paul's 17 official neighborhood districts. This at times may seem a bit goofy especially when some areas like the Midway Center at Snelling and University seem more apart of one neighborhood (Hamline-Midway) but really are a part of another (Merriam Park). In the future I hope to cross reference areas like these.