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Archiver > PA-OLD-CHESTER > 2002-09 > 1031179189


From: "Gail Steckel, NET" <>
Subject: Re: Cemetery plights
Date: Wed, 4 Sep 2002 18:41:33 -0400
References: <B99A97B8.2559%agemmill@earthlink.net> <040a01c253b3$9801c760$c600a8c0@mshome.net> <005c01c25413$2237f6c0$246b0cd8@intelos.net>


yeah, well, I knew when I was typing it that it was probably just my
optimistic side taking over!!! LOL!!!

----- Original Message -----
From: "Sandra Ferguson" <>
To: "Gail Steckel, NET" <>; "chester list"
<>
Sent: Wednesday, September 04, 2002 9:00 AM
Subject: Cemetery plights


> Gail, old buddy, you ARE being naive if you believe that all stones (and
> bodies) are always removed. The road in front of a large municipal
cemetery
> where
> my great-great grandparents, and 2 children are buried was widened in the
> 40s and the gravesites effected supposedly all moved to another municipal
> cemetery. No so in our families case (and others I know of), and I walked
> both cemeteries time and time again, looking for them, and they sure
hadn't
> been moved. Finally I met the caretaker who showed me where to look down
> over the back of the hill, behind the original cemetery, and there, barely
> discernable, you could see bits and pieces of lots of markers sticking up,
> where they had been thrown and NOT moved. I'm sure my family is under the
> new road, literally, and their stones thrown over the hill......we all
know
> stories like this, ...believe me, there is often little consideration for
> the dead, when it comes to "progress"! They are at the mercy of
> roadbuilders and developers and unscrupulous individuals of all kinds. I
> have one friend who located the site of a family cemetery, only to
discover
> there was nothing left, and that a "neighbor" had taken all the markers
and
> put them together to make a fence, and used the cemetery to plant a
garden!
> There was a big brouhaha a couple years ago in York Co, where a church
> wanted to build an activities building over the graves of their OWN
> members.....they said they'd move the headstones into a "basement" under
the
> new building, and couldn't understand what the bit complaint was! There
> was no mention of the bodies, as if the stones were the important thing!
> Can you
> imagine? The local historical society became involved and got a writ
> preventing them from starting work and took it, I believe, to the
> legislature, where it was disallowed, (partially, I imagine, because the
> church had owned land across the street from the church, which would have
> been an appropriate location for the
> building, but had sold it not too long before . So, there would have been
> no need to disturb the graves. I could not BELIEVE a church could be so
> insensitive about their own dead.....but they were!
> S.
>
> > Maybe I'm being naive, but surely those old graves were moved, weren't
> they?
> > I recall an old church and graveyard along Rt. 3 east of West Chester
that
> > finally got "in the way" of progress. The old (and I mean old!) graves
> were
> > dug up and relocated. Am I being naive? Maybe you should check with
the
> > county to see if there are records as to what was done with those old
> > graves....
> >
>
>
>


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