Yesterday I spent an absolutely delightful morning surrounded by Ossining history . . . in Dale Cemetery cleaning headstones.

If you’re reading this blog, I’m assuming you have some interest in the past. Along with that often comes a fascination with cemeteries.  (Well, it does for me!)

My family will tell you that I’ve forced them to wander through cemeteries all over the Western world. (Don’t get me started on the summer we drove through the Somme in France.)

 But you can learn so much about a culture and about its history from reading gravestones.

One of the things that always shocks me is the number of children and babies one finds in old cemeteries.  You’ll see the headstones of the parents and surrounding them, the tiny headstones of 2, 3, 4, 5 children who didn’t make it past infancy.  So so many babies.   And then there are the 5, 6, 7-year- olds as well.  It’s gutting, really, when you think about it.

And I had a lot of time to think about it today as I was working on this gravestone:

But wait, first I should tell you a little about why I was in Dale Cemetery in the first place.

There’s a marvelous local organization called the Ossining Historic Cemeteries Conservancy whose mission is to help preserve Dale and Sparta cemeteries.  Active for about a decade, it’s spearheaded by a group of dedicated and capable folks who have done their research, learned the best practices for cleaning old headstones, are super organized, and very, very friendly.  

Once a month, from about May through October, they choose a section of either Dale or Sparta cemetery, set up all their equipment and welcome volunteers to help scrub the lichen and dirt off old headstones.  They keep excellent records and take the time to look up the people under the stones, sharing their stories on Facebook and in a monthly newsletter.

Today, they were set up in Section 3 of Dale Cemetery and I had the privilege of cleaning the headstone above.  The OHCC has it down to a science and they provide all the tools you need, plus instruction.

First, you gently scrape off whatever you can from the dry headstone using a plastic scraper.  Then you use a manual pump sprayer filled with water to wet everything down and scrape off more.  After that, in comes the plastic dish brush to scrub some more, all the while rinsing with the sprayer.

There are toothbrushes and wooden sticks to get right into the crevices.  

Finally a gentle cleaner is sprayed on and after a few minutes, scrubbed off.  A few more rinses and voila!  

It’s wonderfully meditative and zen – you can indulge your inner obsessive compulsive and just gently scrub and pick and scrape.  It’s also oddly restorative, concentrating on just one thing, cleaning away decades, sometimes centuries, of soot and grime and lichen. And there is such a sense of accomplishment at the end, because no matter what, the stone you’re working on looks better than it did when you started.

Plus, you’re engaging with the place in a deeply historic way. Dale Cemetery was founded at a time when cemeteries were more than just places to bury the dead. They were often elegantly landscaped, with an eye towards creating serene and bucolic views. Families would picnic among the graves of their loved ones in the almost parklike atmosphere. According the OHCC website, in the October 8, 1851 speech given at its dedication, Dale Cemetery was described as”one of the most beautiful and appropriate rural cemeteries of the State.”

And so it is. The day I was there, the weather was perfect, the trees were lush and shady, and the company was affable and pleasant. As you work, and the details of the stone become clear, you can’t help wondering about the person beneath.

In my case, I was cleaning the headstone of a three-year -old.

Three.  Years.  Old.

Oh, Barbara Ann, what happened to you? And where are your parents?  Barbara Ann’s stone is solitary, with no obvious relatives of any sort nearby.  There are a couple of other tombs within a few feet, but datewise, they don’t seem connected.  I’m hoping that a review of the Dale Cemetery files will help clear up this mystery, but in the meantime I’m left with the thought of poor little Barbara Ann, who died at the beginning of the Depression, sleeping anonymous and alone for eternity.

Of course, I can’t help making up a story.  What did she die of?  Alas, there are so many things to choose from in those days before vaccines and antibiotics:  measles, mumps, rubella, rheumatic fever, scarlet fever, chicken pox, polio, whooping cough, diphtheria, pneumonia, tetanus.  While we don’t think of these illnesses as death sentences today, they took many children back then and if they didn’t kill them, often left them with lifelong disabilities.  Mumps could cause sterility, polio could paralyze, rheumatic fever could leave cardiac issues. The list goes on . . .

Little Barbara Ann suffered the worst fate of all, and has lain alone and obscured for years. Thanks to the OHCC, today her stone is clean and her story will soon be told. (And I’ll be sure to update this post when that happens.)

Next OHCC event is on Saturday, September 9, 2023 at Sparta Cemetery.