A Grave Concern: Mark your calendars

Sadly, the Woodland Cemetery Living History tour scheduled for tomorrow, June 26, is cancelled.

Woodland does have some other exciting activities planned for later this year:
August 21, 2011 — Annual Scavenger Hunt (1 pm)
We did this last year and it was a lot of fun.

September 24, 2011 — Geocaching with the Boy Scouts (but open to the public)
I haven’t done this, but my understanding is that the locations they find correspond with the Boy Scout oath.

October 2, 2011 — Murder Tour 2011
This is new, and I’m really excited about it.

East Cleveland also has a Halloween tour scheduled again for this year – October 22, 2011. This was a great time last year, and they have promised to have a different tour this year to encourage repeat visitors.

This is what I know about right now – I will update with more dates as I know about them.

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Woodland Cemetery events for 2011

I just received my electronic copy of the Woodland Journal, the newsletter of the Woodland Cemetery Foundation. For those of you ready to mark your calendars for 2011, I wanted to post these dates here from their website.

May 21, 22, & 28, 2011 – Decorating Veterans’ Graves
May 30, 2011 – Memorial Day Ceremony honoring black Civil War veterans
June 26, 2011 – Living History Tour
September 24, 2011 – Geocaching with the Boy Scouts
October 2, 2011 – Murder Tour

They also have events that do not have definite dates yet, such as the annual scavenger hunt and the dedication of the memorial to Sarah Lucy Bagby Johnson, the last person prosecuted under the Fugitive Slave Act. Visit their website, mark your calendar, and help support the preservation of this historic Cleveland cemetery!

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Historic Cleveland Cemeteries Scavenger Hunt!

As I had advertised in advance, this past Sunday was the Historic Cleveland Cemeteries Scavenger Hunt, sponsored by the Woodland Cemetery Foundation and the Monroe Street Cemetery Foundation. Monroe Street Cemetery is unfortunately closed due a the gate collapse, so the scavenger hunt started at Erie Street Cemetery.

At Erie Street Cemetery, participants received a crossword puzzle and then had to visit a dozen or so graves marked with balloons to solve the puzzle. Once the puzzle was solved and confirmed as correct, you drew three cards for your poker hand and could set off for Woodland Cemetery.

At Woodland Cemetery, which is much larger and provided a lot more opportunity for clues, the challenge was steeper. To participate, you chose a quadrant of the cemetery and then received a map of that quadrants sections and a series of photographs of epitaphs from tombstones. For each tombstone, you received the section and lot (and grave number if applicable) and the epitaph both photographed and written.

You had to locate the monument and discover the family name associated with the epitaph.

After completing that, you received the final two cards for your poker hand, as well as any bonus cards (obtained through bonus questions or purchase). There were monetary prizes for the best poker hand, dead man’s hand (which went unclaimed), and the worst poker hand.

The afternoon also included raffles and a Chinese auction for gift baskets donated by local businesses and organizations. We left with both gift certificates for a local restaurant we frequent, but I did not win the Monroe Street Cemetery gift basket that I was hoping for. Maybe next year.

All in all, it was a delightful day, and I look forward to more events like it!

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Historic Cleveland Cemeteries Scavenger Hunt

Just a reminder that this is today, starting at 1 pm at Erie Street Cemetery. According to the website information, it costs $15 and there are possible prizes. I’m not affiliated with it in any way, I just love the concept and encourage support of local cemetery foundations! Expect more great photos from the adventure and a full report later this week.

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Don’t worry – I’m unarmed… (and a scavenger hunt)

While the title of this post is a little smart-alecky, I don’t consider what I’m posting about to be a light topic.

The title came to me while I was looking at this photograph of a memorial for the Lacey family in Woodland Cemetery in Cleveland. The erosion and possible vandalism to the Lacey monument is sadly typical of Woodland in general. It is a cemetery in disrepair. There is a cemetery foundation, which does its best, but we all know how hard it is for non-profits in general, and in this economy in particular. A few cemeteries are extremely well-off, but most historic cemeteries have few resources towards their upkeep.

So if you care about cemetery preservation, find out if your local historic cemetery has a foundation, and consider throwing a few bucks its way the next time you are making charitable donations. In that vein, while researching this post, I discovered that there is a Historic Cleveland Cemeteries Scavenger Hunt this weekend. Hope to see some of you there!

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