I’m sure almost everyone has heard that once again we have decided not to have our annual picnic this year. It is with great regret and concern for everyone that we made this decision. With so many new cases of covid and deaths in Bates and surrounding counties, we’ve had to be careful. We are keeping all of our plans for the Mission Harmony tour and picnic on hold and will outline the activities planned for next year. Everyone who has registered for our tour will be personally called when the event takes place. We thank everyone for their interest in this activity.
We had the pleasure of welcoming retired teachers from the region who came to visit the museum and the school on September 8th.e. They all had a great time and were happy to have Sophie (Maugraine) Papin visit and learn about Mission Harmony education while they had lunch. Individuals or organizations wishing to arrange tours like this can do so by contacting Beverly at 417-395-4288 or Phyllis at 417-395-2594. We would be happy to visit you and schedule a visit for you.
Now we have to visit you about the status of our organization. Last year we faced a major problem. As you know we have our organizational complex here in Papinville and it is rural and we share with the creatures of God that live around us. Unfortunately, several of these creatures (squirrels) decided they wanted to live in our school building and destroyed part of the school property. We are happy to report that everything has been fixed and that we have taken steps to deter their return. But it all took money. Then there are lights, water, insurance and mowing which have been ongoing expenses. With no event generating money every year for the past two years, we need a little help. We want to keep everything in good condition and continue to have the facility to use and in doing this we would like to ask for your help. If you would like to donate any amount, that would be greatly appreciated. We have printed slates as trivets commemorating the establishment of Harmony Mission in 1821. The first 25 people who donate $ 50.00 or more will receive one of these trivets for free. Just know that whatever amount you could donate would go towards the monthly bills and maintenance of the property so that everything goes smoothly so that we can welcome you again when this health crisis is under control. Donations can be sent to our Treasurer, Phyllis Stewart, 6721 SE Market St, Rockville, MO 64780-8249. Thank you very much and everyone stay safe.
A 40-year veteran of cemetery management is fighting to keep White Plains rural cemetery from collapsing by adding a crematorium.
One spring day in early April 1984, Lorraine Kennery was sitting in the middle of her parents’ driveway in Mahopac, sifting through a PennySaver, looking for a job when she spied: “Need help?” a cemetery superintendent; house provided as part of the compensation.
She had recently left a difficult marriage and returned home with her 5 year old son. “When I saw the job ad that came with a house, I didn’t care what else I was doing,” she says. “The most important thing was a roof over our heads. “
Kennery posted her resume that day and was called in for an interview a week later. She was offered the job with a modest salary of $ 7,000 in the first year and started as the superintendent of Oakwood Cemetery in Mount Kisco this weekend.
Operating at a loss and running out of land for burial grounds, White Plains Rural Cemetery sees a crematorium as the solution.
At Oakwood, Kennery was a one-woman show. She mowed the lawn, sold the plots and dug graves. If the side of the hill was steep or the gravestones were too close together, she would dig graves by hand with a shovel. “I just wanted to make sure I got it right,” Kennery says. “I couldn’t give them an excuse to let me go.” It was 11 years before she took a week off, and it would be a lifetime among the graves.
Twenty-one years later, Kennery had established herself as a seasoned cemetery keeper and accepted a higher paying position as executive director of the 165-year-old White Plains Rural Cemetery. As with Oakwood, the new job came with a house.
Kennery’s trajectory as a caretaker was suddenly called into question when, due to the pandemic, the cemetery quickly began to run out of burial space. “Before COVID,” Kennery says, “we planned to have a few more years of graves available. Today, there are less than 100 plots left.
In 2020, the cemetery saw a 111% increase in burials. Meanwhile, funeral directors were turning down families due to the influx of requests and the inability to bury the bodies quickly enough. Many families have chosen to cremate instead of waiting.
For New York’s population of over 19 million, there are only 48 crematoria. A state like Oregon, with 4.2 million inhabitants, has 66. Brendan Boyle, executive director of the New York State Association of Cemeteries, explains that it is extremely difficult to obtain a permit to build a crematorium. , as several agencies are required to approve the application in addition to the strict regulations of the State Cemeteries Division. “It’s a lot of obstacles to overcome,” he says.
In the United States as a whole, cremations now account for almost 60% of all bodily dispositions. JP Di Troia, president of Fresh Pond Crematory in Queens, the oldest crematorium in the United States, said they had experienced a 30% increase in their typical workload during the pandemic.
Kennery is anxious that the crematorium’s revenues also cover the cost of repairing cracks in the walls that emit little puffs of white plaster as cars and motorcycles pass on the adjacent freeway.
Fortunately, Kennery anticipated the cemetery’s capacity issues and in 2013 started the conversation about building his own crematorium. According to New York State law, once people are buried, they have the right to remain buried in perpetuity. In the same year, at a special meeting of the cemetery board of directors, the crematorium was approved.
But it wasn’t that easy to get permission from the town of White Plains. In 2014, the cemetery submitted a permit application to the city’s zoning council. After two years of processing, the zoning council rejected the cemetery’s permit application, saying a crematorium “would change the essential character of the neighborhood.” Not to be discouraged, the cemetery took the case to the New York State Supreme Court.
There were three public hearings on the crematorium, and many White Plains residents went out to oppose it. Some feared that the value of their home would drop. Others worried about air pollution. In White Plains Rural Cemetery Assn. v City of White Plains (2019), the court voted in favor of the WPRC, saying it would be “arbitrary and capricious” for the city of White Plains to prevent the cemetery from building a crematorium.
Getting permission to start building the crematorium is an ongoing struggle due to a shortage of some materials, drastic increases in costs for others (eg, steel), and delays from the city. The result is that a construction schedule has not yet been determined. “Everything is rolling on this crematorium,” she said. “It’s life or death for the cemetery.”
As the industry evolves around it, Kennery may consider rural White Plains ownership once the crematorium is operational. It will be run with a full-time crematorium operator and a new part-time office manager. “I’ll be there to ease the transition to the next person when I retire in 2024,” Kennery says. “I have invested a lot emotionally in this place.”
As Kennery sits at his dining table, an off-white lace tablecloth coming out of his clasped hands, it’s obvious how much energy and care she has put into her house. Kennery is anxious that the crematorium’s revenues also cover the cost of repairing cracks in the walls that emit little puffs of white plaster as cars and motorcycles pass on the adjacent freeway. “Not for me,” she explains of the repairs. “I am just one person.”
Kennery, as always, looks to the future when ownership passes into the next competent hands. She hopes whoever replaces her as the graveyard steward will love and care for her, as she has for over two decades.
A history of the Association of Catholic Cemeteries
Thomas lester
Friday March 26, 2021Culture
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Thomas Lester
It was recently announced that the Association of Catholic Cemeteries of the Archdiocese of Boston (CCA) was making its archives, covering the period 1833-1940, and cemetery maps available online. This has encouraged us to better understand the cemeteries and cemetery associations in the Archdiocese, and therefore this week’s column provides a brief history of the CCA.
The origins of the CCA can be found in the Roman Catholic Cemetery Association (RCCA) incorporated by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts on May 19, 1868. It enabled the members of the corporation – Archbishop John J. Williams, Father George A. Hamilton and Father George F. Haskins – to secure up to 100 acres of land at Malden “for a rural cemetery or burial site, and for the erection of graves, cenotaphs or other monuments, for or at the memory of the dead. ” In addition, “the power to grant and transmit to any person or persons, the unique and exclusive right to bury in one of the aforementioned lots”.
Based on this evidence, the RCCA led to the establishment of Holy Cross Cemetery, Malden, consecrated on September 27, 1868. The cemetery would become the final resting place for Catholics across the region, not just those in and around Malden. immediate.
The RCCA evolved during Cardinal William Henry O’Connell’s tenure from 1907 to 1944, which began to consolidate Archdiocesan administration.
On January 15, 1910, members of the RCCA signed articles of agreement, setting out all “rights, franchises, privileges, land, buildings, inheritances, real and personal property, easements, things in action, assets and property of all kinds. and description, name or nature belonging to that company … will be attributed, transferred, transmitted and entrusted to the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Boston, a single company “and will be passed on to his successors in this role.
The change brought compliance with canon law, which required that diocesan property be in the name of the archbishop. The land being in his name, the archbishop often finds himself appointed president or treasurer of various cemetery associations. For example, a 1940s RCCA officers document shows Cardinal O’Connell as president, treasurer, and director; Mgr. Michael J. Splaine as Registrar and Director, and Mgr. Richard Haberlin as a director.
Another initiative during Cardinal O’Connell’s tenure was to ensure the perpetual upkeep of cemeteries. On December 1, 1927, he expressed his dissatisfaction with the elaborate coffins, floral arrangements and pomp with which funerals and burials were held in Catholic cemeteries. What he found most appalling was that after such great demonstrations, the resting places of those buried seemed to be neglected.
Rather than tolerate the costs associated with these scenes, he instead urged all pastors and superintendents to demand that the lot owners invest in a special trust for the perpetual upkeep and upkeep of the cemetery grounds.
Cardinal O’Connell was replaced by Cardinal Richard J. Cushing in 1944, and four years later he established the Office of the Director of Cemeteries, effecting the dissolution of the RCCA.
It was announced by a memorandum of January 22, 1948, indicating “with immediate effect … a diocesan director of cemeteries with a central office for the clearance, within the framework of the provisions of civil and ecclesiastical law, of questions relating to interests. and the maintenance of diocesan and parish cemeteries. “
Cardinal Cushing continues: “The deplorable state of many of our diocesan cemeteries prompted the appointment of such a director. We hope that with his help we can finally accomplish real reforms in the maintenance of cemeteries under our jurisdiction. At the very least, a central office will be able to investigate the constant complaints of landowners in our own cemeteries and to some extent avoid widespread criticism of the poorly maintained resting places of our fallen devotees.
The problems included “sunken graves, accumulated garbage, uncut grass, overturned monuments, incomplete or obscure records and general neglect.” He attributes the causes to “manpower problems, limited funds, inadequate equipment or lack of interest”.
The Cemeteries Director was responsible for planning and overseeing improvements, promoting and collecting perpetual custody fees, studying and resolving specific local issues, and saving the upkeep of cemeteries through sharing the cost. equipment, labor and materials.
There was a discussion on whether the director of cemeteries should also oversee parish cemeteries. Initially, cemeteries that pastors no longer wanted to manage were accepted, although those that continued to be maintained by parishes had to conform to archdiocesan standards.
The parish cemeteries entrusted to the care of the archdiocese tended to be divided into two categories. First, the parish cemeteries that are full or almost full; with no income from lot sales or burials, there was no money to maintain the grounds. The other reason was linked to the creation of new parishes. For example, if Parish A had a cemetery and ceded territory to the newly established Parish B that included its cemetery, Parish A would often not want to remain responsible for its upkeep.
A June 1951 document published in the Director of Cemeteries Records provides an overview of the requirements of cemeteries management. He says many people think the role is that of a caretaker responsible for the appearance of the property, but this is only the case in the smallest of the cemeteries. A cemetery director of Archdiocesan cemeteries should have knowledge of engineering, landscape architecture, horticulture, sales, cemetery law, personnel management, public relations, accounting and office management.
It was unrealistic to hire someone with these unique skills and who is experienced for each cemetery, so hiring a central manager and additional regional managers who could be well paid was ideal. The arrangement also relieved the pastors of their responsibility so that they could take care of their many other tasks. Father Arthur Lyons was the first director of cemeteries from 1948 to 1964, and was succeeded by Father Thomas B. Grady from 1965 to 1968, who in turn was replaced by the first lay director, Thomas McTiernan, later this year.
The current iteration of the Association of Catholic Cemeteries of the Archdiocese of Boston was incorporated on June 29, 2001. It currently oversees 25 cemeteries in the Archdiocese of Boston. More information can be found on their website: ccemetery.org.
Please note that the Boston Catholic Cemetery Association, Holyhood Cemetery Association, and St. Michael Cemetery Association are private cemetery associations in Boston not affiliated with the Archdiocese.
– Father Thomas Ryan, CSP, heads the Paulista North American Office for Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations in Boston.
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City manager Rochelle Small-Toney told city council the plan is to have the Unity Cemetery on the agenda for discussion at the council’s working session next month.
Councilor Reuben Blackwell raised the issue at Monday’s regular council meeting, where a resident spoke about the historically African-American cemetery and Councilor Andre Knight made remarks.
Small-Toney, in response to Blackwell, pointed out that the council had requested a report and made it clear that she and her team are committed to providing an update on Unity Cemetery during the March working session.
The board meets regularly twice a month, on the second and fourth Monday, and normally holds a working session before the start of the first regular meeting of the month.
The purpose of a working session is to discuss issues that Small-Toney and the board believe require further explanation, study, or discussion. Council working sessions are chaired by the mayor pro tem and city councilor Richard Joyner is currently the town’s number 2.
The next working session is scheduled for March 8 at 5 p.m.
The outcome of discussions at the February 8 regular council meeting made it clear that a future working session would include returning to a 2015 list of recommendations from then-municipal staff regarding Unity Cemetery.
The recommendations included permission from then-municipal staff to negotiate a maintenance and management plan for Unity Cemetery, which sits off Grand Avenue in the eastern part of town, between a Hardee’s restaurant and Shaq’s. After Dark.
Unity Cemetery is an 18 acre site. The cemetery dates back to at least the 1830s, but when family members died or left the Rocky Mount area, the cemetery began to look more like a forest than a burial place.
The condition of Unity Cemetery became more of an issue over the past year as resident Samuel Battle continued to bring up the topic during the public input phase of regular council meetings.
Tarrick Pittman, owner of computer services company CoolGeeks, began organizing a group that made a community clean-up effort at Unity Cemetery a reality on February 6.
Battle, Steve Cederberg, Steve Pridgen and Pridgen’s wife Tracy also played a key role in the cleanup effort.
Cederberg is Sales Director for the Rocky Mount-based Jay Group, which wholesalers footwear worldwide.
Steve Pridgen is a US Air Force veteran who works in tire sales and service. Tracy Pridgen has a long history of organizing and coordinating events in the Rocky Mount area.
The community cleanup group has scheduled a second cleanup from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. on March 13 at Unity Cemetery, with a reset date of March 19 in the event of inclement weather.
During the public contribution phase of Monday’s regular council meeting, resident Hap Turner approached the speaker’s podium to talk about Unity Cemetery.
Turner said a study from when Steve Raper was city manager shows the town of Rocky Mount bought two acres of land adjacent to Unity Cemetery from two people.
Turner said information showed those two acres were in turn donated to the Unity Cemetery Association.
Turner also said the deeds show that the town of Rocky Mount subsequently transferred 23 one-person and one-church burial lots and that those 23 lots were part of the two acres the town had acquired from the first two people. .
“So in light of this compelling proof of deed, the Town of Rocky Mount evidently now has the authority and, more importantly, the duty to immediately undertake a cemetery restoration project – and to save this part of the Unity Cemetery and the remarkable African American history it holds, ”said Turner.
He suggested the city connect with the community cleanup group and engage the grassroots organization in another volunteer cleanup day, with a focus on those two acres.
He also suggested calling on a firm specializing in the study of cemeteries to carry out a ground radar survey in order to identify and draw up a map of the existing graves.
Later in the meeting, Knight, calling for redress for past moral injury of racial discrimination, cited what the then Rocky Mount Town Aldermen Council unanimously adopted at the late 1930s: “It will be illegal to bury any white person anywhere. within the City of Rocky Mount Business Boundary, except at Pineview Cemetery, or bury Blacks anywhere within the City of Rocky Mount’s Business Boundary, except the Unity cemetery.
Pineview Cemetery is located along Raleigh Boulevard southwest of Unity Cemetery. The Town of Rocky Mount operates the Pineview Cemetery.
Knight, whose Unity Cemetery is located, had the subject of the burial place added to the agenda for the February 8 regular council meeting after many volunteers got involved in the cleanup two days earlier.
At the February 8 regular council meeting, Knight said he believed the problem with what had happened two days earlier would be the lack of lifelong care once the hot rainy season arrives.
Knight has made it clear that he believes the upkeep of Unity Cemetery will be a major undertaking and that the Municipality is the only one capable of maintaining Unity Cemetery after the cemetery has been cleaned up.
At the February 8 regular council meeting, Knight said the town has started to focus its efforts on downtown redevelopment and improving the quality of housing in Rocky Mount, but he said council of the time had kept Unity cemetery as a priority.
There are also documents from the period 2014-2015 on the conclusions of the municipal staff of the time regarding the Unity cemetery.
Randy Rogers roamed the winding paths of Green Lawn Cemetery, his un-tucked chambray shirt flapping in the wind and the John Deere Gator he steered with one hand, lifting colorful cyclones of fallen leaves behind him.
Rogers was scorching the daylight, he knew it, and he still had two trees to plant and security cameras to get around before the afternoon sun sank below the horizon. But even if he hadn’t finished when darkness set in, it would have been OK. Because here, for him, even the night blanket brings a joyful reward.
Because if he stays quite still, he can smell the coyotes lurking here as they come out of their dens. And if he listens carefully enough, he hears the howls as they gather the others together for their night hunt. And that’s just one of the countless things that reminds her of what a special place this is entrusted to her care.
“Green Lawn has become a part of who I am,” said Rogers, the volunteer chairman of the board of directors of the Green Lawn Cemetery Association and its only paid employee as an executive director. However, as the 54-year-old with a shrug and a smile points out, it’s only supposed to be a part-time job despite his regular 50 or 60 hours a week.
“All the family stories here, all the family stories, reflect our city,” he said. “And in addition to its historical importance, it is a place to find peace, tranquility and nature. You can focus here.
Others call him the “resident saint” of the cemetery for endless work that sometimes borders on madness (they add with a kind laugh). Many see it as a treasure for its historical knowledge when he leads countless tours and his respect for those who rest here. But above all, everyone who meets him simply calls him friend.
“Randy lives and breathes in Green Lawn Cemetery. We are so lucky to have it, ”said Lynne Jeffrey, president of the cemetery’s nonprofit fundraising branch, the Green Lawn Cemetery Foundation. “Whatever he does, he’s running at full speed.”
She recounts how, when Rogers devised the plan for the cemetery (which is an official arboretum) to invest $ 15,000 a year to plant 200 trees a year, no one ever dreamed that he would plant 75 himself. % in the last six years.
Then, her voice rising in an air of disbelief and with the art of any good storyteller, she exclaims: “And you know what?” Imagine that! I mean, he goes to Pennsylvania every year to personally buy the trees!
She keeps. “He’s a saint. He always says, “I became Green Lawn and Green Lawn became me.”
A combat veteran who commanded by the Ohio University ROTC, he spent 28 years in active duty, in the reserves and in the Ohio National Guard in positions ranging from psychological operations and war on infantry and logistics.
In the late 1990s, he began to observe birds as a hobby. He even has a presentation on bird watching in Iraq.
And that’s mostly how local lawyer Warren Grody got to know him. Both avid ornithologists, Grody worked with Rogers several years ago on a project to Scioto Audubon Metropolitan Parks Project.
“The only thing about Randy is that he’s never gonna be bored,” said Grody, also a dedicated Green Lawn volunteer. “His military background means he knows how to plan a project and get it done. He’s amazing.”
So let’s go back a bit and explain.
Before Rogers retired from the military, he bought a house on the West Side in 2012 and hung a single bird feeder in the yard. The hobby quickly became an obsession. And soon after, he discovered that Green Lawn was a bird watcher’s paradise.
Read more:Green Lawn wants to capture the original intention of the founders
Read more:Jim McCormac talks about the majestic old trees of Green Lawn
Rogers says the cemetery combines a lot of what he loves: history, nature, conservation and preservation and being an official.
On this recent busy fall day, he started out with paperwork, registering donations and sending emails. His lunch was spent the same as every day. Exactly the same. At 11 a.m., he goes to WG Grinders on W. Broad Street where he always orders Pizza Grinders with sausage, a few chocolate chip cookies, and iced tea with four Sweet’N Lows.
He knows it sounds ridiculous but he craves order in his life. He accuses the military.
“It’s always about getting a job done,” he laughs. “And lunch is a chore.”
But shortly after returning to the cemetery just before noon, his cell phone rang. An employee of the operating company who oversees the daily work at the cemetery was digging for a back-up drainage pipe near the New Garden Mausoleum and found the problem. Water spat out everywhere. “Maybe you should come take a look,” he told Rogers. So Rogers left.
After diagnosing the problem and figuring out the next steps, he set off in his van to check on the progress of workers installing 78 new headstones at the graves of some of the thousands of Union soldiers buried at Green Lawn.
“It’s easy to feel like you’re on a treadmill,” he said. “But then I come across a monument, or a hundred-year-old native tree, a reminder that what we are preserving here is history one story at a time. We preserve the memory of families, it is lasting.
As for Green Lawn himself, he has his favorite spots. He likes section G, “the heart of the cemetery”. It houses the first burials and some of the oldest trees. It still features the original Christopher Columbus topography with an ice ridge as the centerpiece of the landscaping.
Yet it is not his most precious place. No, it’s called Island 10 near Cemetery Pond and Historic Hayden Mausoleum.
Here, under an old chinkapin oak and next to a newly planted baby sassafras, is the Rogers Clan’s final resting place.
Patriarch Garnett L. Rogers, a Marine who served in Vietnam, died in 2019 and is now commemorated there with a cenotaph. Eventually Randy Rogers’ mother will rest here as well, as will his brother and Doreen, and, of course, Rogers himself.
Rogers and his wife often picnic here, spreading a blanket and lying on their backs to look through the canopy of tiered trees. There they think about all that life has offered them and count their blessings.
And they think about what comes later.
“We look and say, ‘Yes, we can live with that sight for a few thousand years,’ Rogers said with a laugh. Then later he gets serious. ‘Where you rest, where you remember of you, it matters. ”
The block of granite boulders that mark the spot is coarse rather than smooth and built to last, its engraving deeply cut so it won’t fade. And on one side is a crest chosen by the family based on the old Irish folk song, “Minstrel Boy ”, a song about keeping your commitment.
The cemetery takes on added significance for a Saskatchewan farming couple since their son died in the Humboldt Broncos bus crash
MONTMARTRE, Saskatchewan. – This sacred piece of land has always been worshiped by Arnold Bieber and his family.
And now they have another family to share their reverence, pride and tears with.
Fairview Cemetery was established in 1906 by pioneer brothers, who established homesteads in the area in 1903. Bieber’s grandparents were among 53 immigrants to Iowa who established homestead and formed the first congregation of brothers in Canada.
More than a century later, Bieber, 92, and his wife Angelene, 91, regularly drive from Regina to visit the renovated cemetery where his grandmother, brother, aunt and several other relatives are buried. He led the modernization of the cemetery in 1995, raising thousands of dollars to build a granite cairn on which all the people buried in the cemetery are listed.
“This is where it all started and this is where all the stories I heard when I was young are found,” said Bieber, who was a farmer in the area from 1950 to 1953.
Bieber recently visited Fairview Cemetery with his wife and son, Don, to appreciate the custom barriers installed by Russell and Raelene Herold. The artistic steel doors feature a pioneering scene with prairie lilies, stalks of wheat and the founding year 1906 of Fairview Cemetery.
The Herolds have spent a tremendous amount of energy and resources maintaining and upgrading Fairview Cemetery since their son Adam was buried here two years ago.
Adam Herold, 16, was the youngest victim in the Humboldt Broncos bus crash, which left 16 people dead on April 6, 2018. The Herolds chose the rural setting to rest their son not only because he is close to the family farm, but also because it was a meaningful place for Adam.
Arnold Bieber was the driving force behind the preservation of Fairview Cemetery and the construction of this memorial in memory of his pioneer family. He shows his brother’s name on Fairview Cairn. | Christalee Froese photo
“It was hard to decide, but we just thought it made sense to us,” said Raelene.
“Adam always came to ski-doo here and he hunted around here too.”
Bieber couldn’t be happier to have Adam alongside his deceased loved ones, as it has been a struggle to maintain the prairie site. After the cairn project was completed, Bieber traveled regularly from Regina to mow the lawn and repair existing gravestones. Over the past four years, however, his declining health has made it difficult for him to travel regularly.
“It was starting to get to the dogs because the grass was not being cut regularly and the caraganas that were here were starting to seed everything,” Bieber said.
He considers the arrival of the Herolds a blessing, who have removed the caragana and maintained the cemetery.
“I was really going down the hill and the day Russell came and asked me if Adam could be buried here I just told them I would take whatever they wanted because I knew what kind of people they were. “said Bieber.
Russell said it was important to ensure that the pioneers who started the cemetery are honored in any improvements.
“We designed the doors on purpose to respect the pioneers who were here,” he said.
The Herolds spared no expense to further improve the cemetery, installing a powder coated metal fence and custom metal gates. The existing cairn and headstones recognizing the original members of Fairview Cemetery remain at the center of the cemetery. Adam’s name has been added to the list on the cairn, and a stone with an engraved granite plaque marks his separate grave.
Russell and Raelene Herold, left, paid tribute to the pioneers of Fairview Cemetery by creating this tribute fence. The Bieber family – Angelene, Don and Arnold – were thrilled to have the new fence at the cemetery where their ancestors are buried. | Christalee Froese photo
“We own the land all around so this is our home,” said Russell. “What’s good for us is that we can work in the field or combine, and we can see that.”
The Herolds also paid tribute to all of the passengers in the Humboldt Broncos bus crash by having their names engraved on stainless steel hockey sticks and planting an evergreen tree in honor of the 16 victims. Each large stick bears the logo of the Humboldt Broncos hockey team, as well as a special symbol for each victim, such as the microphone for announcer Tyler Bieber and a steering wheel for bus driver Glen Doerksen.
“We tried to do everything so that you didn’t have to worry about the upkeep and it would be there for a long time,” said Russell. “We hope people stop and enjoy and for us, it’s just nice to come and spend time here.”
Fairview Cemetery is located 16 kilometers south of Montmartre on grid 606 and four kilometers to the west.
I am often confused when I recommend a cemetery as a place for a leisurely trip– especially at a time when death is on the minds of many. But since I acquired an Ancestry account several years ago, I’ve often found myself in a long-forgotten cemetery in a place like New Vienna, Ohio, looking for my great-great-grandfather on a Saturday. at random, to find a five times deleted grandfather. Or, in defiance of my loyal traveling companion, travel for miles to visit Jack Kerouac’s grave and drop a pen, or Sun Ra’s grave to drop existential vibrations. Communicating with the dead, wandering the sacred and unknown life of people you will never know, is, to some extent, a morbid fascination, of course. But it is also a chance for mediation, reflection and delight in being alive.
After all, you have a captive audience and social distancing hits differently.
TOGreen lawn cemetery on the south side of Columbus, with 360 acres and over 154,000 burials, you hear much of our city’s rich history. It is, in retrospect, Columbus’s first park, and a place where you can spend hours walking aimlessly or attentively, absorbing history, admiring art, and identifying the natural elements that abound.
“At the time of Green Lawn’s founding, attitudes toward death were more influenced by the Romantics and the arts. Death was no longer seen as dark, ”said Randy Rogers, president of the Green Lawn Cemetery Association. “These cemeteries just outside of town were part of the rural cemetery movement. You wanted a cemetery with green spaces, a natural topography and old woods. Green Lawn came before the first city park of Columbus, which wasGoodalein 1850.
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In his sturdy but worn John Deere golf cart, Rogers traveled the narrow trails of the vast expanse of Green Lawn.The place has seen flooding, pandemics, grave looting and the rise of urban sprawl around it, making it a respite less removed from the noise and bustle of the city than when it was created. On every other lap Rogers took, it showed a Medal of Honor recipient, an associate of Wyatt Earp, a Civil War veteran, a nurse stricken with treating patients with the 1918 Spanish flu, famous botanists, abolitionists and a murderous mistress. Olympic pistol champion who invented a still commonly used veterinary tool. Cemeteries are simply the best museums, if you know where to look.
“We tell people we have 154,000 stories and I know about 1,200,” Rogers said. “But these are just people stories. We also have stories about the markers themselves; how they were built and designed. Stories about trees.
On this tour, I was specifically looking for lesser known Columbusonians: Billy southworth, inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame that has coached the St. Louis Cardinals to several World Series; andAlice schille, a modernist watercolorist. And with that, Rogers was on the move. He knew exactly where each stone was placed.
In the past, I had seen the cemetery’s most famous residents, includingPrescott Bush (patriarch of a presidential monarchy), but today I was also looking for the grave of Marion Tinsley.Tinsley, a doctor from combinatorial at Ohio State University, is universally regarded as the greatest checkers player who ever lived. His gaming genius was so complete that he lost just seven games, and he defeated the Chinook computer after retiring as the world champion in 1992 at age 64. Its small ground away is engraved with a checkerboard. Until today, Rogers did not know that Tinsley was a resident.
“There is a new story that I just learned, so that’s 1,201.”
To think that Rogers has just heard of Tinsley is a testament to the evolution of the cemetery, as well as a reminder that a cemetery is not a place of finality or stasis, but something that is constantly changing.
In fact, there is always something new or to be fixed at the cemetery. Just a few weeks ago, Green Lawn unveiled themonument of the “deceased”, which commemorates the anonymous graves of pioneers displaced from the razed city cemeteries of the city center. Soon there will be a sculpture ofMuggs the dog, to better locate the unpretentious stone of Muggs’ most famous owner, writer and designer, James Thurber. The biggest question mark the cemetery will face is how to find the $ 2.5 million in funding needed to rehabilitate the magnificent 1920s mausoleum of industrialist Charles Hayden, which has a Tiffany glass dome,Haydenville tiled floors and four large Italian murals in an interior that the public rarely gets to see. It is such a grandiose grave that Hayden has been said to have spent his children’s inheritance there.
These giantsOzymandian the monuments to fortunes built at the beginning of Columbus are a stark but sumptuous contrast to those lost stories that Green Lawn also tries to preserve. Like that ofElliott Blaine Henderson, a forgotten African-American poet who was buried far behind Green Lawn in an unmarked grave. In 2019, the Green Lawn Association gave his resting place a beautiful marker, including one of his poems of fire and brimstone as an epitaph.
For the pleasure of traveling and going out, the cemetery is always a fundamental opposite to urban life. Besides the many stories of the Sullivant family, or the curious story ofEmil Ambos’ brass fish, Rogersreport a hive of wild bees or migrating birds (the cemetery is a designated site in Audubon). With the creaking of the leaves and the chill of the air in early October, this creates a tranquil environment that still has plenty of life to do.
This is certainly a dilemma for any mortal walking through a cemetery. Where will i be– other than dust in the wind– In 500 years? I often think of this, not of myself, but of someone like the irreplaceable icon of Columbus Rahsaan Roland Kirk, buried in a poorly maintained part of town with few visitors. Maybe he needs to move to Green Lawn? With a festive statue? They have a lot of space. Rogers predicts that with the remaining acreage, they have room for the next 100 years. And they’re good at staying there, with their usual meticulous maintenance, for centuries to come.
But when it comes to ghosts, which is certainly the reason why I chose this destination in the middle of October, this is just pure rumor. There are no ghosts in Green Lawn. There are certainly hauntings at the immaculately restored Greenlawn Abbey next door (at one time a fierce competitor of Green Lawn). But at Green Lawn? It’s only in our imagination.
“You usually don’t find ghost stories haunting the place where they were buried,” Rogers said. “Obviously cemeteries have a reputation for being a scary place, but we don’t have any stories here. They usually hang out where they lived or where they were killed.
Park Lawn Cemetery is one of the largest cemeteries in Toronto.
The beauty of this 73-acre cemetery belies its deep connection to local farming traditions, which, like many things dating back to the 1800s, hint at a dark and murky history.
Park Lawn Cemetery is Etobicoke’s largest cemetery.
As Etobicoke’s largest cemetery, there are over 100,000 burials here, ranging from local farm families to a number of politicians and musicians such as Jeff Healey.
The most besieged mayor in Toronto history, Rob Ford, rests here. His father, Doug Ford Sr., and Mr. York himself: former mayor of the York Municipality, Fergy Brown.
The cemetery has more than 100,000 burials on 73 acres.
But of the thousands of people buried here, 75 of them, ranging from toddlers to late teens, lie in anonymous graves.
Two mass graves in Park Lawn Cemetery are where you’ll find the remains of 75 children at home: young people who came to Canada on ships from the UK to find work between 1869 and 1949.
People buried here range from local farm families to politicians.
It is a tragic part of the country’s history. Approximately 35,000 children were reportedly brought to Canada by by Barnardo, a still-existing children’s charity founded in England by a Christian evangelist named Thomas Barnardo.
Many came as farm laborers and indentured servants who were contracted out to rural families across the country. Many have been terribly abused, worked to the bone, and lived overall miserable lives.
The cemetery also houses two mass graves where 75 children are buried at home.
Some were murdered by their employers, others died of tuberculosis or in childbirth. But regardless of the cause of death, their bodies have been dumped in the same plots for over 50 years, never identified by friends or family.
But thanks to an organization called the British Home Children Advocacy and Research Association and $ 16,000 in donations, a granite monument was placed on one of the plots in 2017, which pays tribute to thousands of these poorly treated young people.
The plots are located in the oldest part of the cemetery, in the northwest corner.
Many Torontonians have used the BHC online register to see if their ancestors were “Barnardo Home Boys” (the girls were sent to Barnardo’s receiving and distribution house in Hazelbrae, Peterborough).
The cemetery is open to visitors, history buffs and nature lovers.
“The graves of the 75 children buried at Park Lawn Cemetery are a poignant reminder that although many children have thrived in Canada, many have not,” the organization said.
“Our country is strewn with the graves of lost Home Children, unfortunately many will never be found.”
The Park Lawn Mausoleum in Heaven was opened in 1999.
The two mass graves are certainly one of the most interesting, if not morbid, parts of Park Lawn’s history.
Much less intriguing is the fact that part of Park Lawn (named Humbervale Cemetery until 1915) almost became a residential development in 1912if not for the work of the Humbervale Cemetery Defense Association.
Seeing deer is not uncommon here, due to the nearby forests on the bank of the Humber River.
Today, the tomb’s careful collection of trees and plants belies its past. Don’t be surprised if you see an assortment of Canadian wildlife, from blue jays to deer families grazing among gravestones.
I imagine some people have wondered why they would ever name Weedsport Rural Cemetery as “rural”.
Why not “Gates of Heaven” or “Evergreen Hill”, or such an eloquent name? The answer is that Weedsport was part of a movement started in 1831 in Massachusetts, in an area between Watertown and Cambridge. There it was decided to build a new cemetery, the Rural Mount Auburn Cemetery, which would be located on hilly terrain, breaking away from the traditional cemetery and colonial era cemeteries where it was important to bring so many people. in the ground in the limited available space. It was felt that a cemetery should be beautiful and park-like – in fact, the word “cemetery” is derived from the Greek to mean “a place to sleep”, rather than a cemetery. The 174-acre Mount Auburn Rural Cemetery is significant because it started a rural cemetery movement across the country.
The rural-type cemetery was intended to convey a park-like atmosphere to those buried there and to visitors. Other cemeteries would soon follow, including Oakwood in Syracuse, Mount Hope in Rochester and Albany Rural, as well as Weedsport Rural in 1860. At Weedsport, “God’s Acre” on South Seneca Street was near full capacity, with no possibility of expansion. , and it was obvious that the growing community had to find a new site. A committee was formed of several city movers and agitators, including WJ Donovan, MC Remington, CC Adams, OW Burritt, CC Caywood and SW Treat. At a subsequent meeting attended by many interested townspeople, the bylaws were drafted under the name of the Weedsport Rural Cemetery Association, as they had decided to follow the lead of Mount Auburn and others. In due course, a board of directors was appointed and on July 2, 1860, it was decided to purchase the original 8.75 acres for $ 787.50. In 1880 it was necessary to purchase much more land, as the original areas had been largely used by the “silent tenants of death” from nearby towns and villages eager to be buried in the beautiful surroundings. Park-like in Weedsport Rural, which was now planted with pines (which are now huge).
Sherri Quint, originally from Houlton and now residing in Westbrook, has been elected chair of the board of directors of the Jewish Cemetery Association of North America. (Courtesy of Sherri Quint)
Sherri Quint, originally from Houlton and now residing in Westbrook, has been elected chair of the board of directors of the Jewish Cemetery Association of North America. (Courtesy of Sherri Quint)
The Board of Directors of the Association of Jewish Cemeteries of North America (JCANA) elected Sherri Quint of Westbrook as the organization’s new president.
WESTBROOK, Maine – The Board of Directors of the Association of Jewish Cemeteries of North America (JCANA) elected Sherri Quint of Westbrook as the organization’s new president.
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