May 19 - Lisa's Musings (on old cemeteries) from Every Day Life

I got an early morning call today giving me the head's up that a group of Lima Township residents would be working to clean up one of the township's four cemeteries.

And if you didn't know about the cemetery, you'd never find it.

I've probably driven by it thousands of times and didn't know it was there. But members of the Chelsea American Legion knew it was there because veteran's graves were flanked by American Flags.

I spied gravestones that dated back to 1801. Some of the stones were so weathered, you couldn't read who was buried there. Others were toppled over or covered in brambles. The site had definitely seen better days.

But a group of 10-15 township residents will spend the next four days cleaning up the cosmetics of the site -- led by the efforts of Ed Greenleaf. But this is just the first phase of the work.

Following the heavy lifting comes the mystery solving. As Greenleaf and other members of the township's cemetery committee will begin contacting families of those buried at the site to try to make heads and tails of all the people who are buried there.

The men are donating their time, their equipment, and their sweat equity to the cause in the names of all of those who went before them.

I'd like to give a shout out to Bill Coury, Don Laier, George Hellner, Ed Greenleaf, Ron Herrst, Craig Maier, Bob Bulmon, Chuck Chamberlain and Tom Bater.

A fitting way to honor former township residents before Memorial Day.