To all at INPCRP: Jack has been in contact with me repeatedly about this cemetery. It is Stockwell/Hammans, and it is indeed in terrible shape. However, it is also on private property, and as I've explained to Jack, the trustee is not obligated to clean it up. We've passed along the property owner's address and phone number to Jack so that permission can be granted to work on it, and if that happens, we'll work with Jack to find some willing bodies to remove the large trees which have smashed most of the stones. We, too, would like to see this cemetery cleaned up. If I sound a bit frustrated, it's because Jack has contacted everyone in the continental US about this cemetery except the person who needs to grant permission: the property owner. I've received calls from our county commissioners, the recorder, other Stockwell/Hammans descendants ... you get the idea. We (our small, 4-person, full-time-employed committee) try to clean up a cemetery or two each year. We choose a cemetery based on its visibility (shameless advertising), its condition (something we can manage), whether it's publicly owned or private (if it's public we can get brawny Community Corrections folks to help), and whether there's a remote possibility that if it's cleaned by us once, someone else will maintain it once or twice a year. We worked very hard on one public cemetery here, Thompson Cemetery in Green Township, with the trustee's support, and he swore he would maintain it once we cleared it out. We recruited the VFW and American Legion and we had a fantastic group of chainsaw-wielding tornados - we cleared a small mountain of trees, brush and honeysuckle vines that day. We even had a volunteer bulldozer operator, which concerned us greatly, since we weren't sure where the outside perimeters of the cemetery were. The point: the cemetery looked terrific when we were done, and stayed that way for ... six months. Now it's completely overgrown with honeysuckle vines again. The trustee didn't follow through, and we just can't go back year after year to one cemetery. We have 167 cemeteries in this county, and most would qualify for the Hall of Shame. I don't mean to sound like I'm whining, but sometimes the frustration just gets to me. (Jack Briles, you understand perfectly!) Too much to do and too few workers. We'd love to do Stockwell/Hammans for Memorial Day. We'll keep you posted on progress to get permission from the property owner. But I've sent Jack the IC code web page explaining the trustee's responsibilities, so no one here need do that. And if someone can pass this along to savinggraves.com, I'd appreciate it. Dale Drake Morgan County History & Genealogy Assn Cemetery Committee Lois Mauk wrote: > Bill Spurlock and I are both having trouble posting to Rootsweb groups. > There is apparently a problem with at least one of Rootsweb's mail servers > today. We're trying this AGAIN. > > Anybody know anything about this Morgan Co. cemetery that was reported to > Bill at www.SavingGraves.com ? > > Lois > > > -----Original Message----- > > From: CHamm47010@aol.com [mailto:CHamm47010@aol.com] > > Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2002 12:05 PM > > To: wspurlock@savinggraves.com > > Subject: Clean up of old cemetery > > > > > > There is an old cemetery located just outside of Martinsville,IN. > > This cemetery is in such bad shape that if one didn't know the > > location, you would not be able to find it. The location is: > > Section 26 Township 12N Range 1E in Washington Township > > Morgan County, Indiana. There are 19 people buried here. > > Can you give me some advice on how to go about getting this > > cemetery cleaned up and restored to a respectful condition? > > Who should I contact? Who should pay for the clean up? > > Would it be the Trustee of Washington Township, Morgan > > County, Indiana? > > Any help you can give me would be much appreciated. > > Thank you very much. > > > > C.Jack Hammons > > ==== INPCRP Mailing List ==== > Cemetery: (n) A marble orchard not to be taken for granite.

Dear Dale: I certainly can understand your frustration. Sorry if I touched on a raw nerve! :-) I get messages from people almost every day saying, "What are you going to do about Such-and-So Cemetery? It's in TERRIBLE shape! . . . " Nine times out of ten, when I ferret out the details, the site is mowed on a regular basis (though not as often as the average golf course) and some of the old stones are broken. Well, this is the true for at least 75% of the pioneer cemeteries in the State. Then, when I get the basic facts out of them, I write back and tell them how to get Marlene Mattox's terrific article on researching cemetery ownership to determine the TAX STATUS of the cemetery property. I suggest to them that, assuming taxes are NOT paid on the property, they need to contact the appropriate Township Trustee to see how they can work TOGETHER to clean up the cemetery. 99% of the time, I never hear from these people again. It's amazing how, when you try to help them get started on finding a solution themselves, they have a lot of reasons why THEY can't do anything about it. They want ME to somehow take on responsibility for the maintenance and upkeep of THEIR cemetery at the other end of the state. And, Dale, I understand too, how disheartening it is to work yourself to death cleaning up and restoring an old cemetery that hasn't been touched in decades. We worked with the inmates from the Clark Co. Jail to clean up a deeded cemetery here, probed for hours for stones in the cemetery (never found a single stone) and advised the church to which the cemetery had been deeded in the 1890s that, though there were no visible stones, we were convinced that there were numerous burials here and gave them what historical information we had been able to uncover. (This church, BTW, has a huge endowment that generates more-than-sufficient funds to care for the large cemetery adjacent to their church as well as this remote site.) The site has been ignored since it was cleared and grew back up completely. Then, last year, the Church petitioned the court for a disinterment order (granted the same day) to relocate these unknown burials so they could sell the property to a developer. (Can you spell: $$$ ?) I haven't spoken to anyone from that church since then! I don't know if I could keep a civil tongue in my head if I have to deal with them again. BUT, Dale, on the other hand, there is a LOT of reward that comes from projects that turn out well. We spent over a year restoring a cemetery adjacent to I-265, working with a variety of civic groups, inmate labor, community service workers, an Eagle Scout, etc. The Township Trustee is genuinely interested in doing the right thing. He built a plank fence around the entire perimeter of this large site. The Sheriff's Office sends an inmate crew in there on a semi-regular basis to weedwhip it. I get a lot of comments from people remarking how nice the cemetery looks. (Unfortunately, a developer was able to get away with disturbing the soil to within 6" of the fence. But if that fence hadn't been there, I imagine the disturbance would have encroached on the cemetery itself.) We've nagged the "powers that be" for about 4 years about another site in the same county, a terribly vandalized cemetery surrounded by woods and ravines and subdivisions. This past year, the site was cleared of dozens of huge dead trees, vandalized graves that had been open for 30 years were filled and leveled and the stones have all been repaired. A ground-level tablet has been carved and installed listing the names of all the known dead buried there. It will soon be (if not already) fenced on all four sides and the Township Trustee is committed to taking care of the site. Yes, there are a lot of discouraging things that happen, but the good SOMETIMES outweighs the bad. Yes, I often want to say, "Oh, just forget about it. Nobody ELSE seems to care!" Sometimes we can't do all that we want to do. But we have to keep the faith and do what we are able. That's all we CAN do. Lois

Ok, time for a joke. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >PICKING PECANS >On the outskirts of town, there was a big old pecan tree by the cemetery fence. >One day two boys filled up a bucketful of nuts and sat down by the tree, >out of sight. "One for you, one for me. One for you, one for me," >said one boy. Several were dropped and rolled down toward the fence. >Another boy came riding along the road on his bicycle. As he passed, >he thought he heard voices from inside the cemetery. He slowed down >to investigate. Sure enough, he heard, "One for you, one for me. >One for you, one for me." He just knew what it was. >"Oh my," he shuddered, it's Satan and the Lord dividing the souls at the >cemetery. He jumped back on his bike and rode off. Just around the bend he >met an old man with a cane, >hobbling along. "Come here quick," >said the boy, "you won't believe what I heard. Satan and the Lord are down at >the cemetery dividing up the souls." The man said, "Beat it, kid, can't you >see it's hard for me to walk." When the boy insisted, though, the man hobbled to the >cemetery. Standing by the fence they heard, "One for you, one for me. >One for you, one for me." The old man whispered, "Boy, you've been >tellin' the truth. Let's see if we can see the devil himself." Shaking with fear, >they peered through the fence, yet were still unable to see anything. > The old man and the boy gripped the wrought iron bars of the fence tighter >and tighter as they tried to get a glimpse of >Satan. At last they heard, "One for you, one for me. And one last one for >you. That's all. Now let's go get those nuts by the fence, and we'll be done." >They say the old guy made it back to town 5 minutes before the boy.....