Tombstone Tuesday

The detail work on this headstone is amazing.I need to go back for better pictures.Many of the earliest graves in this small cemetery in Rocklin Ca. are of natives of Finland.It is interesting the variety and number of immigrants in the early burials in foothill cemetery's.

The Living and the Dead

I write about cemetery's,the dead and death,I enjoy what I do.But life,and the living, come first.Today was my day off.A rare one in that I am getting two days in row off.And the weather was cool enough that being outside for the day in the heat was not likely to cause me to join my photo subjects unexpectedly.I should go south I thought,down valley to visit family and family graves but I could not bring myself to take the 3 hour plus drive,leave early,stay overnight.I'm tired from work and duties at home and just could not work up the energy to go.
That's one reason I was looking forward to this day I planned.I was going to spend the day driving around the gold country,visiting old graveyards,taking pictures..Get out of the city,away from responsibilities,get something new to share on here.No deadlines,no company that did not want to be doing what I was doing.
But sometimes life and the living that we love change our plans.Instead I spent the day helping my helpmate through the Kaiser hospital system.A leg pain that was at first ignored turned out to be something you don't want to ignore-a blood clot.He is home with meds and under my watchful eye.I'm glad I was here and not up in the hills or down valley,maybe the ancestors whispered in my ear,"stay home,we will be here,waiting".The living first,the dead will wait for me.

Wordless Wednesday

Local cemetery's suffer theft,vandalism

Here is a link for a local(Sacramento CA area) news story and video on theft and vandalism at two local cemeteries.I have to agree with lady in the video,these people can not have ever had to bury someone they loved to do these things to the dead and their loved ones.Most likely it involves supporting a drug habit as most small time theft seems to these days.I feel horrible for the family's and caretakers who have to deal with being violated like this and hope they can catch the people doing it. http://cbs13.com/local/cemetary.theft.vandalism.2.1124378.html

http://www.cbs13.com/video/?id=58542@kovr.dayport.com

Tombstone Tuesday

Assistant state fire Marshall,Loving mother of seven.
"Forever in rolling hills and daffodils."
Rocklin Cemetery,Rocklin,CA

TIME article on unclaimed bodies

I caught a blurb on our local news the other day about how the number of unclaimed dead had gone up at the local coroners office.This article in Time says it is happening everywhere.http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1914780,00.html?xid=feed-yahoo-full-nation-related Family's just can't afford to bury their dead.It's very sad but I can understand completely.I know we are supposed to plan ahead and save for this inevitable day but you have to wonder a bit these days how do we do it all?We are supposed to save for your retirement,pay for your own medical,pre-pay for your funeral,save for the kids education,save some more for your retirement and medical costs as you get older because it's not enough.So what are you supposed to live on now?

Tombstone Tuesday

Jared Sheldon was granted the Mexican land grant for Rancho Omochumney inJanuary1844.The land grant was surveyed for the Mexican government by a young surveyor living in Monterey,William Tecumseh Sherman.He split the grant with his friend William Daylor and together they build successful Ranches on the Consumnes river.Before Sheldon could apply for a land grand he had to convert to Catholicism,take a Mexican name,become a Mexican citizen and find the land.Then improvements had to be made on the land within a year.Jared Dixon Sheldon,a native of Vermont,was killed by miners in a dispute over the flooding of mining claims.He rests in the historic Sloughhouse cemetery in Sloughhouse California.It is hard to believe these huge millstones were brought all the way from Mexico but they were.

The Peculiar and Promiscuous Methods of Burial in Early Mission Days

That is the title of the this article in the Sept.28 1885 edition of the Santa Cruz Daily Surf.I don't know that I have heard the word "promiscuous" used in relation to a cemetery before!
The article further says that the excavation for the walls of the new church "revel a subsoil composed of about equal parts of adobe,decayed coffins, and dead Indians"."A promiscuous lot of "remains" of Spanish and Indian origin,buried in the most heterogeneous manner possible to imagine".Big words for the time and place wouldn't you say?That there were over 3 thousand documented burials in a area of less than a quarter of acre.It was a crowed place no doubt!
The article further states"some of the redwood coffins are in a astonishingly good state of preservation,but the mortality contained therein has resolved itself to brown mold and a few detached bones."I have to wonder why would you open a coffin that is in a good state of preservation?And why would the church allow such a disturbance of the dead?
"Some of the coffins are of very creditable workmanship and adorned with crosses formed of silver headed nails."
It talks of a mass grave of 15 buried without coffins that was supposed to be from a smallpox epidemic.Then goes on to mention several Indian burials;"Two stalwart skeletons in possession of aborigines of some dignity and importance in their day.Their skulls are of capacity sufficient to protect a liberal supply of brain matter, and they carried to the grave with them long strings of beads and shells and there are indications that pipes and other articles now impossible to identify were also deposited with them."
A very different time and place.All of them,native Indian,Spanish settlers,Mexican immigrants,Irish loggers and those first white men who "jumped ship" and stayed, were scooped up and hauled to the new cemetery,six wagon loads.Reburied together in what is now the Old Holy Cross cemetery
There they rest in a little open meadow.Unmarked and mostly forgotten by everyone.I was glad I found out about this place and I really enjoyed visiting a learning about it.I can't wait to go back.Maybe I will take some flowers,and say the names I know out loud,to remember.

Wordless Wednesday

"I had fun everyday of my life."
"Snook" Silva
St. Vincent De Paul cemetery,Rancho Murietta CA.

Tombstone Tuesday

I could not read the dates myself on this.A transcription on Findagrave list the last name as Wade on both markers and a date of 1879 born and died ,Tena Wade,on the only legible one to them.This was in the Sloughhouse Pioneer Cemetery,Sloughhouse CA.I would say a third or more of the legible stones in this cemetery are for children.Very interesting place.Crazed commuters,tourists and logging trucks zipping by on a two lane road a few hundred yards to one side.On the other side farm land,cattle lowing in the fields, a farm cat running down the dirt road with a gopher in his mouth, a huge Swallowtail butterfly drifting by my head several times as I took photos.Pyramid Peak and the Sierras vanishing in the heat haze to the east as the temp. crept towards a hundred plus.Past and present together.Summer in the valley.

August GYR Carnival:Favorite Photo

This was tough for me because I always think my favorite photo/best photo is still ahead of me somewhere but that's a personality problem I have.I dream of taking pictures in Oaxaca on Dia de Muertos, of New Orleans and London,the old burying grounds of the North Eastern U.S. and New Mexico. I am sure if I ever get to visit them there will be wonderful graveyards and headstones to photograph, but for now my home is California and this is what I see. Most of my ancestors lie in unmarked or mass graves ,even those who may have had the money for a nice marker at the time of burial. This photo is of a unreadable marker in the San Juan Buatista Cemetery in San Benito Co. CA This cemetery was dedicated in the early 1840's as "the Mission cemetery could hold no more". There are a number of these old wooden markers that survive and many other old graves.It is here that my great,great grandmother Maria Teodora Garcia would have attended her mothers funeral when she was 13 years old.I believe her father is buried here as well,he died when she was 10,murdered,"three leagues from the Mission".He was the son of the first non-Indian child born west of the Mississippi. Behind and below this hill the cemetery is on, runs the San Andres Fault.In 1809 the first San Juan Mission and all buildings for miles around were leveled when there were earthquakes for 9 days. These and others of my family rest here.I like to look at this marker and think it might belong to one of them,this is my favorite photo.This is my California.

Wordless Wednesday

St. Joseph Cemetery,Sacramento CA

Seeking Room For The Dead

With all of the negative news about the cemetery employees at Burr Oak in Illinois and the awful things they have done,this story in the New York Times provides a wonderful counter point.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/19/nyregion/19graves.html

Grave Robbers

With all the recent publicity about the Burr Oak Cemetery in Illinois and the terrible things done for profit there I thought I would share the following article.Grave robbing is nothing new but it is the scope of the crime at Burr Oak that has appalled so many people-and maybe the idea that we should be better than that by now.
These articles are in the January 13 and 16,1903 San Francisco Call newspaper
GRAVE ROBBERS' NEFARIOUS DEED IN LOS ANGELES
Grave robbers broke into the tomb of Donna Maria Pico, wife of Pio Pico, the last Spanish (actually,Mexican)Governor of California a few days ago and removed the remains, which had beers buried for nearly fifty years. The well preserved skeleton was found by a boy this afternoon in old Calvary Cemetery, fifty feet from the Pico family vault. All the flesh had fallen from the bones, but on the hands, which were folded over the breast, was found a pair of gloves, and shoes and stockings encased the feet.
It is supposed that the vandals expected to find valuable jewels on the body, as the Picos were wealthy at the time of the death of Donna Maria in Santa Barbara in 1854,but if they obtained anything there is no evidence of the fact. The body rested In a niche in the vault, protected by a marble slab, on which were inscribed her maiden name, Maria Ignacia Alvarado, wife of Pio Pico, and a verse in Spanish. Inside of a hermetically sealed box rested the coffin, richly trimmed with gold and silver fringe and lined with silk, while the body was clad in rich laces, velvets and satin, all in a good state of preservation. The remains had been embalmed, which accounts for- the good condition of the skeleton. Old Calvary Cemetery has been abandoned for many years and is in a state of dilapidation. Many of the early Spanish families used it as a burial ground but a large portion of the bodies have been removed. Don Pio Pico's body, which rested be side that of his wife,was not molested

Tombstone Tuesdays

This is in Old Holy Cross,Santa Cruz CA To me it appears that a older stone that was broken has been set in concrete?I don't really understand the way the grave is covered with a tunnel though.I can see sealing the grave site with concrete to stop vandals, and this cemetery has a history of vandalism, but why the tunnel?If anyone else has seen this or has any ideas about it let me know!Maybe they were going to guarantee she rested in peace!

Writing Your Own Obituary

This was brought to my attention by a thread on Findagrave.com by JHofmann I think we can all learn something from this lady's obituary.Not just about writing our own obit though that's a great idea.But about how we look at our own lives and loved ones.I thank her for a lesson I sometimes need a reminder of.How even the small,everyday things count in life. http://obits.cleveland.com/obituaries/Cleveland/obituary.aspx?n=Nancy-Lee-HIXSON&pid=129179739
http://www.37days.com/2009/07/live-an-irresistible-obituary.html I included both links because online obits don't stay for long and I could use a reread of this one now and then.And the blog 37 days looks interesting too!