Starting Again: Honoring Family, History, and a Dream Worth Pursuing

Entrepreneurship is rarely a straight path—it's a journey of evolution, iteration, and rediscovery. As I begin my next chapter with Iowa State University’s Startup Factory and Venture Mentoring Service, I find myself revisiting the core reason I started down this path in the first place: the desire to connect personal and community history in a meaningful way.

For the past few years, I’ve been professionally engaged in cemetery mapping, helping cemeteries modernize their records and preserve burial information. But my journey began much more personally—with a simple question: How can I manage my own family history within a spatial database? What started as an individual curiosity has grown into a much deeper understanding—family history is not just personal; it is woven into the fabric of local and community history.

In working with cemetery managers, I’ve repeatedly heard the same request: "How can we link the stories of historical figures to the genealogical records people find online?" So many visitors to cemeteries aren’t just paying respects—they’re searching for connections, trying to piece together the lives of their ancestors and understand their place in history. It’s a deeply personal engagement with the past, and I realized that the tools we have today don’t fully support this kind of discovery.

That’s why I created Cultural Fabric—a platform designed to bring history to life by weaving together information scattered across the web into a structured, spatially-aware database. It allows people to place historical documents, cemetery records, and personal research into geographic context, illuminating the movements, relationships, and stories of the past.

Building the Future with Iowa State’s Support

Now, as I take Cultural Fabric into the Startup Factory and Venture Mentoring program at Iowa State (for the second time), I’m focused on transforming this vision into a scalable, impactful business. This program provides entrepreneurs with the mentorship, resources, and structured learning needed to refine a business model and bring an idea to market. I’m eager to learn, adapt, and position Cultural Fabric as a tool that not only serves genealogists and cemetery managers but also historical societies, researchers, and communities looking to preserve their local heritage.

Why This Work Matters More Than Ever

The past three years have been incredibly difficult. My family has been through a lot of hard changes. In early 2022, my mom was diagnosed with cancer. At the same time, I was navigating the challenging process of adopting my sister’s children. I stepped away from my work to focus on what mattered most—family.

Mom passed away last October. It’s hard to put into words what losing her means. I miss her. I wish she had more time. I wish she would have been able to do what she had been planning for for years to do... I could tell a thousand stories. And I will.

I talked to her all the time about my project and she could see how excited and dedicated I was to it. She knew I stepped away from it only out of absolute necessity. The weight of her diagnosis, realizing as the days ticked by that she was losing her battle. Becoming a Mom overnight. My deteriorating relationship with my sister, who I love dearly but couldn't help but feel resentment towards... It was a lot.

Mom understood me, could tell I was struggling. She said to me 'Don't give up on your idea, Allie'.

I'll never forget that. It's like a lighthouse. She loved lighthouses.

So, with a heavy heart, and a determined nature so much like her own, I'm starting again to honor her legacy, her wishes, my love for her and the incredible person she was.

If you’re interested in cemetery preservation, historical mapping, or bringing the past to life through digital tools, I’d love to connect. Let’s build something meaningful together.

www.spatialagency.org/culturalfabric

My Mom, Teresa

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