April 30, 2008 Dead History?

Its a foggy overcast evening, but the moon is shining through the dreary clouds. Youre walking through the woods and come upon a clearing. As the fog swirls around your ankles, you can make out squarish-oval objects up ahead. Creeping closer, the objects come into focus to create a cemetery. Over a dozen gravestones litter the earth like freckles on a persons nose, each stone is different in size, pigment shade and quality. The air is silent except for the sound of the breeze gliding over the grasses; youre all alone. Feeling eerie goose bumps slither up and down your spine, you decide to fight your fear of creepy places and explore. Walking on the damp, moist ground your first gravestone is of a mother who died during labor. The date on the stone reads, 18591889. Underneath the date is the loving phrase; will always be alive in our hearts. Just beside her is her unborn baby which has its own small gravestone. After examining other gravestones, you discover that this is a cemetery from around the 1800s into the early 1900s. With one exception the last person buried there was Joe Brickman, who was a private in World War I. Many of the deceased are mothers and little children. This indicated a lack of proper medical and hygiene care, contributing to shorter lives. Soon you realize that cemeteries arent just burial plots lined together in rows, but together they can tell a

story and present interesting history. A few of the gravestones are broken or split. The surfaces are worn away by wind and rain like an eraser on paper, making the names and dates are barely legible. Other stones are hidden by soaring weeds or entrapped by the encroaching wood line, forgotten in time. Breaking away branches that cover a couple of stones you discover that these people were married. Ahead of them are their parents and other relatives. You realize after tracing through the family tree that there are three generations buried here. Looking into a persons family tree is a special experience. By learning whos related to who, what the deceased person did for a living and what experiences they had during their lifetime allows you to get to know that person better. In a community cemetery there are usually plots of whole families laid to rest. In military cemeteries, a soldier maybe buried next to someone he never knew. The date on a gravestone can tell you whether or not a person lived through a national crisis or a war. The location and the material of the stone on a grave can tell you if that person was poor or prosperous. My grandparents lived through the Great Depression and World War II. By how they lived you could see how the 1920s affected their life style. My great Grandpa collected everything from twist ties to milk cartons because he grew up learning not to waste anything. I have heard stories of people keeping all their life savings inside the

walls of their home because they did not trust banks after the depression. When you look at a stone, the language that is written on it can tell you what ethnic group that person was from. Since the United States is called the melting pot of the world, people from different nationalities have the language they spoke written on their gravestone. Many cemeteries in southern Illinois have German roots. Symbols and art work on the gravestone give personal meaning to the deceased. A stone may have angelic beings or the deceaseds face carved into it. Very dedicated love ones may frequently visit the grave and put flowers by it or just sit and talk to the deceased about current events in the world. A cemetery comes in many different conditions. Recent burials have shiny smooth headstones and are topped with fresh dirt. As time goes by, the dirt will have grass growing in it and the weather will change the stones appearance slowly. Older cemeteries have faded stones with splits and moss growing on them. Some stones might become eroded by the wind, rain and salt in the air. Vandalism is direct disrespect to the dead. It can leave a cemetery ruined because its hard to put back the stones to the rightful place after being mixed with others. Not all graves use gravestones as markers for others to identify where the deceased is buried. In some places crosses are used to

show where someone was buried. Along a highway, a group of flowers with a sign bearing the deceaseds name states that a loved one died there. It is a reminder to the passing motorist of the dangers of irresponsible driving. Memorials are also a type of markers stating that a person died somewhere. Some national memorials that exist are Pearl Harbor, World Trade Center, and Arlington National Cemetery, etc. These special commemorative places allow people to remember why and how somebody died. Many great leaders throughout history have had unique burial places. The pharaohs of Egypt built gigantic pyramids so that the people would remember. The natives of both North and South America created vast temples and memorials to honor the dead because they believed that respecting the dead would bring luck and safety to them and their families. After looking around for what seemed like hours in the cemetery you trace your steps back to where you started. You can see all the footprints that you made from walking around since the depressing fog began to clear. Tonight you have learned a lot about cemeteries just by observation and have made up your mind to visit others in the area. The history of the forgotten dead is very much a live when we take the time to investigate.