Good morning, Dawn Peters shared this article with me today and I thought some of you might find it interesting. We all need to be saving our history -- the old cemeteries. Betty Jane Grave responsibilities AS DEVELOPMENT ENDANGERS FAMILY CEMETERIES, SOME CONCERNED CITIZENS TRY TO SAVE THEM By Beverly Fortune HERALD-LEADER STAFF WRITER David Perry/Staff Sanden uncovered the name "Morton" at the Payne family cemetery, located on property Ball Homes is developing on Sandersville Road. More photosWhen Jacob Kizer died in 1827, he was buried in the family cemetery on his farm, west of downtown Lexington. Nearly 180 years later, Kizer is haunting the developers of Masterson Station neighborhood. His grave -- forgotten in an unmarked cemetery overgrown with weeds -- lies in the path of bulldozers clearing fields for the expanding subdivision. The imprint of tire tracks in the grass can be seen going over Kizer's headstone, now broken in pieces. Masterson Station resident Lisa Sanden and her husband Ron stumbled across the graves last August. When she saw the damage, Sanden called developer Steve Hayden to ask if he knew the cemetery had been desecrated. Concerned that the graves would be bulldozed, Sanden said she wanted the developers to know, "We knew about the cemetery. They couldn't hide it, pretend it wasn't there." Two weeks ago, Hayden told Sanden the cemetery will be preserved. "We're going to build around it," Hayden said last week. Each year, as suburban growth moves deeper into formerly rural land, old family cemeteries and abandoned graves turn up in the way of new development. The conflict between growth and graves is increasingly common in Fayette County and across the South, where farm families tended to bury their dead in small cemeteries on their own land. Such plots allowed for quick interment and easy maintenance of the grave. But, as families moved away and years went by, many cemeteries were forgotten, just like Kizer's plot in north Lexington. "It's not hard to lose a cemetery," said Nancy O'Malley, archaeologist at the University of Kentucky's anthropology museum. "A family dies out, the land is sold, headstones fall over. Grass grows over them pretty quickly." O'Malley said there are "tens of thousands" of family cemeteries in Kentucky. There's no way to know the number for sure because Kentucky lacks a central inventory. That could be changing. The Kentucky Historical Society has started an online cemetery database, and others are taking steps to find and preserve old cemeteries. Sanden, 26, a stay-at-home mom who moved to Lexington with her family 18 months ago, has become fascinated with Lexington's early history and hopes to focus new attention on long-forgotten cemeteries. After her discovery in Masterson Station, she organized the Fayette County Historic Cemetery Preservation Group to help other groups raise money to document and preserve old burial sites. Fayette County Attorney Margaret Kannensohn spent three years documenting 200 cemeteries in Lexington; most were abandoned, many containing graves dating to the early 1800s. Boone County has published a brochure mapping the locations of its 196 cemeteries. Interest in preserving small burial plots "is growing by leaps and bounds" because of the popularity of family genealogy, said Ann Johnson, administrative assistant at the Kentucky Historical Society in Frankfort. Yvonne Giles, who searches small cemeteries for slave graves, attended a recent meeting of the Fayette County Historic Cemetery Preservation Group and said that bulldozing graves destroys a cultural heritage buried in the soil. "Once graves are built over with houses, there's no going back," Giles said. 'Lengthy process' In Kentucky, strict laws govern moving graves. "It's a lengthy process," Johnson said. To receive a permit to relocate an abandoned cemetery, the applicant must wait out a 60-day notification period that gives relatives an opportunity to approve or object to the move, then fiscal court must declare the site abandoned. In Fayette County's case, the Urban County Council acts as fiscal court. To declare a cemetery abandoned, the applicant must prove the graves have been untended for at least 10 years. Once fiscal court has authorized relocation of the graves, the state registrar of vital statistics issues a permit. A funeral director or coroner must oversee the disinterment. All costs, including disinterment and reburial of remains, are paid by the person who wants the cemetery moved. It is a crime in Kentucky to bulldoze or destroy a grave site. Relocation "can easily cost $3,000 to $4,000 per grave space," said Dan Scalf, general manager of the Lexington Cemetery. Lexington received two requests to move graves in the past five months. One was from Hayden and Baker for the Jacob Kizer Cemetery; the other from Troy Thompson to move six graves at 350 Waveland Museum Lane for a Ball Homes development. Thompson said the graves will be relocated to a greenspace in the subdivision, the area fenced and markers placed on each grave. "We don't know names, so the headstones will say 'unknown person,'" he said. He said he has run into old cemeteries several times when developing subdivisions. He moved 23 graves from Tates Creek Road and two from Andover subdivision, all to the Lexington Cemetery. At the 13th hole of Andover Golf Course, he left 19 graves, and enclosed the space with a stone fence. In March, Ball Homes halted work on an 80-acre tract at Sandersville and Greendale roads when the company was notified of an abandoned cemetery on the property by descendants of people buried there. The relatives said they did not want the graves moved. Jonathan Norris, general counsel for Ball Homes, said the company will relocate a road through the subdivision to avoid the graves. "Once descendants were found, we wanted to follow their wishes," Norris said. Under Kentucky law, if relatives don't want a cemetery moved, it must stay. 16 graves found At the Jacob Kizer cemetery in Masterson Station, UK graduate preservation student Joe Pierson, at Sanden's request, probed the ground with a tire iron, locating 16 graves. Some lacked headstones and were merely sunken places in the ground. Hayden said he knew there was a cemetery on the property, purchased by Masterson Properties 10 years ago. But he never visited the site. He said he was unaware of the damage to the graves before Sanden called. He and partner James Baker first wanted to move the cemetery. But Sanden located a Kizer relative in Missouri, e-mailed her about the cemetery, and the woman said she did not want the graves moved. Earlier this week, Hayden said the graves will not be disturbed. "I don't have a problem with it," he said. Hayden will donate the cemetery to any group organized to maintain it. Sanden said it's important to keep such graves where they are. "My neighborhood was not always a subdivision. We know it's new," Sanden said. "Pioneers who worked hard and risked their lives to build Lexington are buried here. We need to be reminded of that, and pay homage to those people." ________________________________________________ Get your own "800" number Voicemail, fax, email, and a lot more http://www.ureach.com/reg/tag