Giant Roadside Crosses

You may want to give some guidance for a more consistent POI file, such as restricting to crosses NOT on a church (or not?), define minimum size for "giant", visible from the road?, permanent structures?, atc.
... Never mind, I read the description under the POI and it is indeed quite detailed.

Hmmm, I've never seen one around here.

Located on I 22
here are link to youtube install
GPS coordinates
Address of location

Hunter's Chapel Holy Church
345 Hunters Chapel Rd, Jasper, AL ‎
(205) 483-6075 ‎ · hunterschapel.org

33.791899,-87.227862

www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxQ4snYsyVE‎

-75.05769 39.95574

60 Ft Tall Steel Cross

The Great Cross of Christ - made of locally-rolled steel and weighing 30-something tons

887 Jumonville Rd; Hopwood PA 15445

... for the comments, suggestions, updates.

I'll update the file as soon as I get home in the next week. My on the road computer doesn't have a proper O/S in order for me to update sooner.

Found about 11 more locations while driving around the last few weeks.

FYI I've scoured the internet searching for information leading to locations of giant crosses. I think I've found most if not all of them mentioned.

The main ones left are the "3 Crosses". There's probably well over a thousand of them still left to find. At least. There's actually a website devoted to carrying on the tradition of the "Coffindaffer" crosses. I'm going to contact them to see if they have mapped out the GPS coordinates.

I drive primarily east of the Mississippi, from Florida to Maine. It just so happens that this is where the bulk of the Coffindaffer crosses are located.

Great idea! The largest Cross in the world is located in Effingham, Illinois == link and geo coord below.

Pic link: http://www.thecross-photo.com/The_Cross_in_Effingham_Illinoi...

Lording over Interstate highways 57 and 70, the "Cross at the Crossroads" was built for broadly noble religious reasons -- and to out-size every other big cross out there, especially the giant cross in Groom, TX, which was both its inspiration and its toughest competition.

198 feet tall and 113 feet wide, forged out of over 180 tons of steel anchored in untold fathoms of cement, the cross can withstand winds hurled by evilest of forces at up to 145 mph. Its stark, slab-sided design conveys the corporate utility of a logo -- no distracting crucifixion blandishments, just the plainest symbol of Christianity.

GEO coords: 39.107537 N , -88.571177 W

Address: W. Knagge Rd, Effingham, IL

http://www.crossusa.org/index.html

N33.66452 W86.83056
I-65 North of Gardendale Alabama
in front of Gardendale First Baptist Church

I marked this location as we drove past.
MO state highways 6 & 146, NE corner.
-93.66383 40.06779
Picture on request.

Since I am now getting steady contributors I have started using Tom Tom POI Editor to verify the locations to avoid duplications.

Thanks to all the contributors so far, and keep them coming! It's kinda fun to be rolling down the highway and all of a sudden a Coffindaffer triplet pops out at you! Keeping the eyes peeled for giant roadside crosses is almost like a game to pass the time... but as we know the symbolism/meaning is much deeper than that.

I have now added a "v" to the end of many locations. This indicates that the location has been verified for an accurate location. The locations are normally well within 100 feet of being directly lateral to the cross position.

I have also annotated some locations that are "directional" meaning that the crosses can only be spotted when going northbound, southbound, etc. This will help to avoid confusion.

In some situations you may have to look a few tenths of a mile away just to spot the cross (from the lateral gps position). So I've also annotated the location with words like "up on the hill" or "up on the mountainside".

At some point around Christmas I hope to be traveling to upstate NY. I remember last year seeing quite a few giant light crosses at night , located on mountains above. Very cool.

Here's a giant cross.

N 33° 51.964 W 117° 43.453

I actually have a geocache located here.

http://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GCQ4VA_crossing?guid=5710...

Now designating the Coffindaffer crosses as "3 crosses." Note the period after the word crosses. From time to time I've come across 3 crosses but they are not specifically the Coffindaffer ones and I'd like to differentiate them.

I hesitate to call them the "Coffindaffer Crosses" because I'm sure if the Reverend were alive he would not wish to assume any glory associated with the crosses.

Giant cross atop Mt. Soledad in San Diego, CA.

http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/13/justice/california-cross-battl...

I see the crossed all up and down I-77. I hope they remain, and more of them spring up!

I-77 and I-81 in Virginia seems to be where a concentration of Coffindaffer crosses are located.

By the way, the file now contains 36 Coffindaffer locations.

many readers many be unaware of the term "Coffindaffer crosses". These are a particular type of roadside crosses named after a man called Bernard Coffindaffer.

According to the latest information I can find there were 1,864 clusters of 3 crosses planted that are called Coffindaffer crosses. see https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/95402798/Christian%20Cro...

This PDF describes in detail what these crosses look like.

So, we have a lot of work to do helping Vito add to his file if he has only 36 of the 1,864. Watch for them.

There are some near me that I can GPS the next time I pass by.

I've annotated the Coffindaffer crosses. In the POI file they are annotated "3 crosses." The dot signifies they are definitely from Rev. BC.

I've often wonder just how many of the Coffindaffer crosses remain. Many were put along the interstates, but with roadway expansion, storms, clearing for farmlands, etc. etc. etc. I'm sure many have been lost.

The most unusual location that I've found the crosses has to be at the back of a truck stop, just a few feet from where the pavement ends. It's on Northfork Road in Elliston VA. The truck stop apparently took great strides in not knocking over/removing the crosses when the parking lot was created/expanded/redone. The truck stop looks fairly new so I'm under the impression that the crosses were there FIRST, before it was built. But that's just a guess.

For some pics, here's a nice blog about the crosses:

http://www.thecarpetbagger.org/2013/07/reverand-bernard-coff...

Very impressive and hard to miss. It's close to the road.

with a @ and a ] at the beginning of the location.

A @ means that the cross location can be viewed from Google Earth.

A ] means that the cross cannot be located with Google Earth, either due to being obscured by trees or whatever.

Many times the crosses can be located from within Google Earth because of the shadows they cast.

will appear around Christmas of this year on CBS Sunday Morning. It will detail his work around the country putting up his triplets of crosses.

This information was forwarded to me from "Crosses Across America".

UPDATE NOTE: The time has been changed for the documentary to air on Sunday Morning, Easter Sunday.

Check out the new 10 minute documentary about the life and work of Reverend Bernard Coffindaffer:

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/many-crosses-to-bear/

The show aired this last Easter Morning.

Sometimes I really struggle to determine what goes into this file and what stays out. By default, ALL Coffindaffer crosses appear in this file. After all, the good reverend's triplets of crosses were my inspiration.

When I spot a cross, the most important thing, besides being free standing, is the size. Next is the quality, and thirdly the location (how many will actually see it when driving by). I hold crosses attached to churches to an even higher standard.

This is why in the POI's log, you'll see where many cross locations have been deleted from time to time. This has been done because the cross, upon further viewing either through another drive by, or through google earth, was determined to be not up to the SQL standard. If this standard didn't exist, the file would be enormous and the crosses within it not exactly that special.

There seems to be a good interest in this file. We're up to a couple hundred downloads now.

FYI, if you're interested, this .csv file can be converted so the locations (designated with an "@") can be viewed using Google Earth. Some of these locations, in street view especially, are outstanding viewing. Cheers to Google!