Last week the Historical Society of Easton introduced a pilot program aimed at raising awareness and funding for the preservation of some of the many aging headstones and monuments at Union Cemetery. The responsibility for preserving, restoring, or righting damaged stones is generally expected to be borne by the family of the person that stone is meant to honor; but how can anyone reasonably expect the sextant of a cemetery to find the descendants of someone who passed a hundred or even two hundred years ago, much less convince those descendants to pay to repair a damaged stone of someone whose very existence they may have never been aware of?
The simple answer is that they can’t. Even if descendants are known, there is no legal obligation on their part to pay for any maintenance on an ancestor’s headstone.
So, how does a cemetery tackle the problem of repairing or restoring grave markers when there are no funds available?
For this, there is no simple answer. If the cemetery in question is considered legally “abandoned,” the town might step in and fund some repairs of those stones in the worst shape. But to be considered legally abandoned, a cemetery has to have seen its last internment at least forty years ago. Forty years? If that seems like an unreasonably long period of time, that’s only because it is.
All private cemeteries rely on revenue from the sale of plots and the continuing use of the burial services they provide. Once the last available plot has been sold, that revenue stream contracts dramatically. As each plot then becomes occupied by a deceased member of the community, that stream shrinks even more as it approaches a mere trickle. With limited revenue, even routine mowing tends to become more burdensome. In a large cemetery such as Union, costs can easily exceed the funds available as time wears on.
Union Cemetery is likely at least forty-five to fifty years from being able to qualify as being considered legally “abandoned”. Every plot has long been sold, and only a few of those sold remain empty, awaiting the owner’s eventual death. Family plots purchased in the 1950’s may remain only partially full, and it won’t be until that last grave has been occupied that the forty-year clock begins to tick.
The only viable means of raising funds lies in the kindness and generosity of the members of the community. But asking strangers to contribute to a generic fund with no specific objective makes fundraising difficult. Choosing specific stones that need work, and then establishing a price that will cover the cost gives donors the opportunity to adopt a single stone where the end results of their donation will be easily seen.
To that end, the historical society originally chose the headstones of four children who passed from this world before the age of ten. None of these stones was in irreparable condition, but all were in danger of seeing further deterioration if no preservation efforts were forthcoming. Two of those children were siblings who died within a few days of each other but who are both interred beneath the same marker. Our goal was to offer stones that were both affordable to preserve and that wouldn’t have seen a direct descendant come forth to fund it.
Two of the original three stones offered for adoption have already been funded, so work on those two should commence soon… If time permits, perhaps even as early as tomorrow! The current remaining stone can be adopted at: The Union Cemetery Preservation Project – Historical Society of Easton Connecticut (historicalsocietyofeastonct.org) . Other stones will be added shortly.
This Saturday, May 18th, sponsored by the Historical Society of Easton, headstone preservation professional Michael Carroll will return to Union to work on several more headstones and monuments. The public is invited to visit anytime between 10 AM and 2 PM to see the work in progress and walk through the grounds to see the remarkable transformation of the once overgrown grounds to their present manicured state by cousins Bob and Bruce Laskay and their team of volunteers. Plus, anyone who spots a headstone they would like to adopt will be happily accommodated by one of our members!!!
