Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there; I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow,
I am the diamond glints on snow,
I am the sunlight on ripened grain,
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning’s hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry,
I am not there; I did not die.

You’ve probably seen this poem before. It was written in 1932 by Mary Elizabeth Frye. She had never written any poetry before this. But the story of a young German Jewish woman, Margaret Schwarzkopf, inspired her to start.

Margaret was staying with Mary and her husband in their Baltimore home. She had been concerned about her mother, who was ill in Germany. Despite her desire to see her mother, Margaret was too afraid to return to Germany because of increasing anti-Semitic unrest. When her mother died, Margaret told Mary that she never had the chance to “stand by my mother’s grave and shed a tear”.

Greatly moved, Mary began writing a piece of verse on a brown paper shopping bag. Later, she said the words expressed what she felt about life and death. The result is a beautiful poem that just about everyone can relate to when they lose a loved one.

I thought about this poem a few months ago when I visited Westview Cemetery. On that day, I was looking for the grave of a mother and her adult son, but it was proving to be a challenge. As I “hopped” down the rows looking, I encountered two different graves where a body was not actually interred. That was because both young men had perished at sea in World War II.

The first one was Guyton Christopher. The only son of a homemaker and a fire insurance salesman, Guyton attended Georgia Tech. According to the 1940 yearbook, The Blueprint, he was on the track team. His best event was the long jump. He was also in the marching band. When he enlisted on September 4, 1941 at Fort McPherson, he wrote that he had attended college for three years and his profession is listed as “actor”. He would enter as an aviation cadet in the Army Air Corps, later known as the U.S. Air Force.

Guyton entered his training and became a member of the 64th Bomber Squadron, 43rd Bomber Group. They were deployed to Australia in February 1942 and went into combat that September. The squadron operated in support of the campaign in Papua New Guinea, first from Australia, then from New Guinea and Owi Island. They were concentrated, in particular, in attacks on shipping.

Guyton was piloting a B-17F “Flying Fortress” as part of a nine-man crew on the day he died. They took off from Port Moresby on a bombing mission against a Japanese convoy bound for Lae, New Guinea. Returning from the mission low on fuel, they attempted to ditch into the Gulf of Papua. Three of the crew members were later rescued but the other six, including Guyton, were never found.

He was posthumously awarded the Purple Heart Medal, two Silver Star Medals, the Distinguished Service Cross, and additional Army awards. His name is listed on the Tablets of the Missing at Manilla American Cemetery and Memorial in Fort William McKinley, the Philippines.

On the same day, I found another monument that told the story of a merchant mariner. Richard Barge was also from Atlanta, the middle son of James and Delia Mae Barge. He attended Technological “Tech” High School. Some famous graduates include legendary golfer Bobby Jones and Chickfila founder Truett Cathy. In 1943, Richard was in Company B of the ROTC. While he never served in the U.S. military, he did lose his life as part of the World War II conflict.

Richard signed on to the U.S. Merchant Marines, which is responsible for transporting cargo and passengers during peace time. During times of war, the Merchant Marine serves as an auxiliary to the Navy, and can be called upon to deliver troops and supplies for the military. While the Merchant Marine does not have a role in combat, they protect any precious cargo.

About 3.1 million tons of merchant ships were lost in World War II. Mariners died at a rate of 1 in 24, which was the highest rate of casualties of any service. An estimated 733 American cargo ships were lost and 8,651 of the 215,000 who served perished in troubled waters and off enemy shores.

Richard served as a messman on the steam tanker SS Oklahoma. Ironically, the Oklahoma had already been hit by a German U-Boat in March 1942 off the shallow waters of Georgia’s St. Simons’ Island. Nineteen men died as a result. The boat was towed to Chester, Pennsylvania to be refitted and put back into service.

In the early hours of March 28, 1945, the Oklahoma was in the Atlantic when it was torpedoed by the German U-boat U-532, captained by Ottoheinrich Junker. It was reported that flames surrounded the ship for a distance of 500 feet and the flaming cargo blazed on the water a mile astern. While 22 men survived, Barge was one of 50 men who perished as the tanker sank.

Two young men, two very different lives. They both died at sea, their bodies lost to the ocean’s harsh waves. Their parents didn’t have the chance to bring their sons home. Although their graves are empty, their sacrifices are not forgotten. Their lives meant something.

They may not be here physically, but their spirits remain.

Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there; I do not sleep.

Whenever I’m asked why Southern writers particularly have a penchant for writing about freaks, I say it is because we are still able to recognize one.— Flannery O’Connor

Flannery O’Connor is one of my favorite authors. She was born and raised in Georgia, but I think she would have found plenty of freakish things in the cemeteries of Charleston. I know I did.

In the South, we revel in the unique and bizarre. Eccentricities are embraced, not shunned. You can see that in the Charleston style of what is called funerary art, which is basically anything having to do with burials or funerals.

One of the first headstones that caught my attention during my cemetery hopping adventures was this stunner in St. Philip’s Episcopal Church’s Western Cemetery. A grinning skeleton reclines against a winged hourglass, symbolizing death’s power over time.

Why would anyone want a skeleton on their headstone?

Skull and skeleton imagery is a holdover from the colonists’ English past. Puritan preachers warned of the dangers of sin in a worldly society. The result could be eternal damnation. These macabre images were to serve as a lesson to the living to be mindful of where they might end up if they didn’t mend their ways.

To Charlestonians, this was not unusual. At this time, there was an inherent awareness of the fragility of life. Considering the number of epidemics (mostly yellow fever) that wiped out many lives in the fledgling city, death was an everyday event.

Another example was childbirth. Today, giving birth is a fairly risk-free event women go through with few complications. But in the 1700s and 1800s, it could easily mean death for both mother and child.

Buried in the Circular Congregational Church Burial Grounds, Jean Legare was one of countless women who died in childbirth. It is unknown if her baby survived. The poem at the bottom reads:

In Faith she Died, in Death she Lies
But Faith foresees that Death shall Rise.
When Jesus calls her hope assumes
And Boasts her joys among the Tombs.

For Christians, the skull has been a death symbol since Medieval times. When you add wings to it (as seen on Jean’s grave pictured above), it becomes a vivid symbol of the resurrection of the spirit.

Such intricately carved slate headstones were not purchased by the average Charleston resident. They were sought after by the wealthy who had the funds to show the world their status. Back in 1727, the cost for such a finely crafted piece of work might cost about $27. Adjust that for inflation and you’re looking at $30,000 today.

Some wealthy Charlestonians were so intent on impressing the living after they died that they ordered their headstones from a handful of known carvers from New England. Their handiwork can be seen in many Charleston cemeteries. Few were marked but some bear the name of these craftsmen, such as Boston’s Henry Emmes. Some carvers even traveled to Charleston to set up their own shops.

With the onset of the 1800s, funerary art began to take on a less macabre tone. This is due to, in part, to the Great Awakening taking place in New England. Salvation was the order of the day and not the Puritans’ Predestination. Angels and cherubs began to replace skulls and hourglasses. Some of the cherubs bore the facial features of the deceased.

Some headstones featured likenesses of the person themselves, as can be seen in the grave of Frances Prue. She shares it with the son she lost in infancy, Thomas. He is depicted as a cherub, his head having wings.

The fact that these headstones were being carved in New England but appearing so frequently in Charleston has raised a few questions for historians. Were these headstones a product of New England that a few Southerners sought for themselves? Years ago, I saw one of those winged skull headstones in a Boston cemetery so I knew the wealthy residents of New England favored them.

Evidence indicates that the high level of education and artistic sophistication of Charleston’s elite created a lucrative market for New England carvers. It was a unique group that most Southerners could not afford to belong to, but those that could provided a good living for those carvers willing to meet the demand.

With the onset of the Victorian era, headstones began to be made of different types of stone as opposed to slate. Carvings became less religious and more artistic in nature as religious tolerance took on more prominence. Images of urns, weeping willows, flowers and other motifs began to appear on headstones and monuments.

To finish up, I want to feature a tomb that is quite rare in American cemeteries. Magnolia Cemetery, on the outskirts of Charleston, is home to an Egyptian Revival-style pyramid tomb. It’s quite striking.

Actor Nicholas Cage actually commissioned his own pyramid-style tomb to be built in New Orleans’ St. Louis Cemetery #1 recently. It’s not very visually appealing, in my opinion, compared to the Smith/Whaley tomb at Magnolia. Cage does have a reputation for being rather eccentric, so it’s not entirely surprising.

I think he’d feel right at home in Charleston.

Divine appointments are meant to be kept. Especially when you’re in Charleston.

Chris and I had our anniversary recently so we planned a beach vacation to Charleston for just the two of us. I don’t think we’d been away from our son longer than two nights since he was born so it was a trip we were looking forward to. We chose Isle of Palms as our home base and were not disappointed.

Both of us had been to Charleston as children with our families. I had come back a few times as an adult so my memories were fresher. But I can still remember my first visit, riding a horse-drawn carriage through the streets as a tour guide expounded on the rich history of this enchanting city.

This time, I was returning as a cemetery hopper. This meant we were going to spend at least one of our three full days nosing around in cemeteries. Chris kindly consented as he has done in the past when we’re out of state. The fact that he enjoys photography doesn’t hurt. In fact, he took most of the photos you will see in this blog post.

One church I was determined to visit was St. Philip’s Episcopal Church. Established in 1681, it is the oldest church congregation in the state of South Carolina. The current building was constructed in 1835 and boasts a beautiful, tall steeple. The gentleman we spoke with there said there is a law on the books that no building in Charleston can be built taller than the steeple. At one point during the Civil War, it was used for sighting during the Union’s bombardment of the city. St. Philip’s chapel bells were actually melted down for the Confederate war effort.

St. Philip’s has a churchyard and a cemetery. What’s the difference? The churchyard is on the immediate grounds around the church and is limited to members of the congregation. Across the street is the West Cemetery, which St. Philip’s is said to have opened for “strangers and transient white people.” Members, however, were later buried there as well. It is an active cemetery and St. Philip’s has a growing membership.

The Western Cemetery also holds a number of famous people. Countless founding fathers (and mothers) with surnames like Pinckney, Pringle, and Lowndes are buried here. But the most notable has to be U.S. Vice President John Caldwell Calhoun (1825-1832). He was strongly in favor of secession and slavery, earning himself the nickname “the Cast Iron Man” for his ideological rigidity.

According to the church’s history, when the Civil War began to break out, there was a great concern that due to Calhoun’s very vocal pro-secession views, invading Union troops might desecrate or totally destroy his grave. Under cover of darkness, his remains were quietly removed from the Western Cemetery and placed in an unmarked area in the church graveyard across the street. After the war, his remains were returned to their original place. His elaborate tomb was erected in 1880 by the South Carolina State Legislature.

I was also keen to see St. Philip’s because a fellow cemetery enthusiast had mentioned he needed a photo of the grave of South Carolina writer Herbert Ravenel Sass. I had never heard of him before but I was game for the challenge.

Sass was a man for all seasons. Among his titles were author, editor, reporter, novelist, ornithologist and naturalist. He wrote passionately about his beloved home state, his articles published in magazines like Harper’s Bazzar, Atlantic Monthly and National Geographic. Several of his stories were turned into movies, including The Raid and Anne of the Indies.

All I knew was that Sass’s grave was a flat marker, having seen a less than stellar photo of it on Find a Grave. I knew Chris and I had our work cut out for us. It was a hot, humid day, the kind Charleston is famous for, but we were determined to try.

That’s when I arrived for that divine appointment I mentioned.

When Chris and I entered the West Cemetery, we noticed two ladies chatting as one of them gently hosed off a grave marker in an attempt to get some mud off of it. After we greeted them, I headed away toward the front corner next to the wrought iron fence line to start looking.

I was so intent on what I was doing that when a gentle voice spoke, I nearly jumped out of my sandals. Turning, I saw one of the ladies smiling kindly at me through the fence as she stood on the sidewalk. She apologized for spooking me and mentioned that there was a particularly interesting grave close by, if I was interested.

We began chatting and she asked if there was anyone I was specifically looking for. I mentioned Sass and I could immediately see the shock in her face. God’s timing suddenly became very real.

Dotty (her full name is Dorothy Parkin Pratt-Thomas Leonard) began to share with me that her parents, now deceased, had been friends of Sass and had purchased his home from him. Her family had lived in it happily for many years, and Dotty had fond memories of the place. She had known the Sass family intimately and was in the process of writing a paper on Herbert Ravenel Sass for her book club.

Dotty then led me over to Sass’ grave, first pausing at playwright Dubose Heyward’s grave. Sass and Heyward had written the book Fort Sumter together. We stood at the Sass family graves as Chris took pictures. I was too stunned to be of much use in that department. I am not sure if I would have found them had Dotty not been there to show us.

Dotty also pointed out her parents’ graves nearby. Her mother had recently died in 2012. It was clear she missed them very much. She excused herself soon after. But I think our chance meeting that day was as special to her as it was to me. I hope it was.

I have no idea why I crossed paths with Dotty on that sweltering hot day. What I’m learning as this journey I am taking unfolds, is that it is better not to ask or to question too much. Some things are simply meant to be.

Because divine appointments are always right on time.

This week, I’m going to cheat a little and share something I recently wrote for another venue. When you’re on vacation, the urge to be a bit of a slacker is hard to resist.

For the last 13 or so years, I’ve written on a freelance basis for a quarterly magazine called Museum Store. Based in Denver, it’s published by an organization called the Museum Store Association (MSA). If you manage a gift shop at any kind of museum, aquarium, historic site, zoo or Presidential Library, chances are you are a member of MSA.

In that time, I’ve written about topics ranging from how to handle school groups to using Pinterest to boost sales to improving inventory management. Maybe it was inevitable that my passion for cemetery hopping would collide with my writing for MSA. When I pitched the idea of writing an article about cemeteries with gift shops, they went for it.

So take a moment to read about this new retail trend. Shopping at a cemetery may sound a bit strange but it seems to be catching on. I’m especially pleased that I got to talk with some of the wonderful staff at Atlanta’s Oakland Cemetery.

Gift Shops in Cemetery Stores – Museum Store, Fall 2013

Peanut Butter and Jelly. Batman and Robin. Bacon and Eggs. Those are pairings that just make sense.

But airplanes and tombstones don’t. Not usually.

Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport is what most people think of when you mention Atlanta (hopefully it’s not those trashy TV housewives). Just about everybody can say they’ve been through Atlanta because of it, even if they never left the building. They don’t call it the World’s Busiest Airport for nothing.

Amid great hoopla in 2001, construction of a new fifth runway began. The final cost was around $1.28 billion dollars. Completed in 2006, it involved enough fill dirt (in some places) to reach 11 stories high. That fill dirt has its own whiff of scandal attached to it, but I digress.

By putting in that runway, what little was left of the Flat Rock community that sat on that property was erased. Fortunately, two cemeteries with deep roots in that area were kept intact. While they both look drastically different, not a single grave was disturbed.

Hart Cemetery was established in 1860 with the burial of Ellender “Nellie” Brown Hart (1822-1860). According to long-time community member Melba Daily, the story of the cemetery’s founding goes like this (from a 2008 Clayton Daily News article):

“My great-grandfather and great-grandmother (John Jay Hart and Ellender Brown-Hart) were walking on their property one Sunday and when they got to that spot, she said, ‘This is where I want to be buried some day,’ and she became the first person buried there.”

“It’s very hard to go there and picture where buildings were, because there’s all those embankments they built for the runways,” said Tommy Jones. His grandmother, Jewel Hart, lived in the Flat Rock community. An embankment for a taxiway is now located on the spot where his grandmother’s house stood. “It’s very interesting how Hartsfield grew and eventually overran the community.”

He’s being kinder than I would be if someone bulldozed my grandmother’s house to put in a runway.

My mother worked for the Delta Employees Credit Union for 15 years. I frequently drove to the airport from Fayetteville and passed through this area, although I had never visited the cemeteries. So when I was recently over that way, I decided it was time to do so.

A sign on Riverdale Road directs you down the short road to the bottom of a deep embankment. The front of the cemetery is bordered by a white picket fence and landscaped with bushes. A sign details the history of the cemetery and lists every person thought to be buried there.

When the archeological study was done on Hart Cemetery in 1995, they discovered 83 graves were buried there. Only 16 had any kind of inscribed marker. A number of them are marked with simple field stones. Two giant magnolias stand watch over them.

It feels somewhat desolate there. The incessant spring and summer rains have left the ground muddy and rough. An island of land suspended in time among rising green mounds, with the whine of jumbo jets flying overhead, it is a surreal atmosphere. One that left me feeling empathy for those with loved ones there. Yes, it was kept intact. But it will never be the same.

Flat Rock Cemetery is located deeper within the labyrinth of airport roads (see map above). The cemetery sits amid the cacophony of rumbling cement trucks, speeding tractor trailers and various aircraft overhead. With over 300 graves (most with markers), Flat Rock Cemetery feels more natural than Hart Cemetery, if that’s possible. It’s a grassy plot of land that is tended fairly well. Someone was mowing the grass on the far side of the property during my visit.

History has it that John Hart (mentioned previously) and his second wife, Elizabeth, helped establish Flat Rock Baptist Church in the 1870s. Although Flat Rock was never a Primitive Baptist congregation, they met in a plain building in the tradition of the Primitive Baptists, devoid of ornament or religious pretension. It was built with two entrances, each approached by three wooden steps with no landing. It’s not known if they were ever used to divide the sexes.

As the Atlanta airport expanded and I-285 was built in the 1960s, much of the old Flat Rock community was destroyed. By the 1970s, the congregation was looking to relocate. They sold the property to the airport authority in 1979 and re-established themselves as National Heights Baptist Church. The church and Sunday School building were still used by various airport agencies before being abandoned, then finally torn down in 1996.

The cemetery is still active. I was able to take a photo for Find a Grave that was for a burial in 2012. There’s a good bit of space available. Several descendants of the Hart family (and others with kin who grew up there) still live close to the Flat Rock area. I’m willing to bet some of them will be buried there when the time comes.

It’s comforting to know that these two cemeteries remain intact. Other cemeteries have met much sadder fates. In 1956, Monument Cemetery in Philadelphia was pretty much wiped out, most of the graves destroyed. Why? To add a new parking lot to Temple University. It’s a heartbreaking story.

At the same time, it’s a situation that leaves me torn. I only know that I’m glad my loved ones aren’t buried directly beneath some airplane’s flight path, silent witnesses to hundreds of unknowing travelers.

Melba Dailey put it this way, “”I just can’t bear to look at the area now. It doesn’t look the same at all. When we drive to the cemetery, I just close my eyes until we get there.”

I think I’d feel exactly the same way.

When I talk about cemetery hopping, I am often asked this question:

Why do you do this?

This week’s post should answer that question for both you and me.

A few months ago, I visited Old Fellowship Cemetery here in Tucker. Oddly enough, it is located at the end of a residential street behind a wooden fence with the name on a simple sign. Four of the graves are of Revolutionary War veterans who ended up making Georgia their home. The stacked stone graves are fascinating. I’ve never seen anything quite like them before.

Located nearby is Fellowship Primitive Baptist Church Cemetery, established some time after Old Fellowship Cemetery was. Nobody I’ve asked locally knows why there are two cemeteries, it happened so long ago.

Fellowship Primitive Baptist Church was established in 1829. The original church building burned sometime after 1910. Most of the cemetery records were destroyed in the blaze but the remnants are said to be maintained at the Mercer University Library in Macon, Ga. I haven’t gotten there yet to see if that’s true, but I hope to eventually.

I’ve read that at most Primitive Baptist churches, the sexes sat on opposite sides of the church. I don’t know if this was the practice at this church. They did have separate entrances for men and women, according to a photo (see above). Despite how it sounds, this was not supposed to be a form of discrimination but a way of showing that marriage between men and women was not the major factor to God. While in the church, men and women were supposed to forget earthly ties and concentrate on their worship. Not each other.

While there’s nothing left of the church today, the cemetery is still there. It’s situated between two churches, the First Presbyterian Church of Tucker on the right and the Iglesia Evangelical Apostle Proseta on the left. From what I can tell, the cemetery is fairly well taken care of and is mowed often.

Having passed it many times, I decided to take a look around one day while my son was attending Vacation Bible School nearby. I realized that many of the graves had not been documented, much less photographed. I spent the next few mornings (before it got too hot) taking pictures and poking around. During my work, I managed to get bitten by ants for the first time. Thankfully, I had on sneakers and socks so it wasn’t too horrible. I think I eventually created over 100 new memorial pages with photos.

Several weeks later, I noticed there was a photo request on Find a Grave for the grave of Carrie Turner at this cemetery. The name did not sound familiar but I had definitely created a memorial page for her. As I looked back in my files, I realized I had forgotten to post the picture, so I quickly did. That, I thought, would be the end of it.

It wasn’t. Not by a long shot.

Shortly after I posted the photo of Carrie’s grave and e-mailed an apology to Janet (the requester), she posted this on my Find a Grave message page:

Thank you so much, my hands are actually shaking writing this, I just know this is my grandmother Carrie. I have spoken to my siblings and we are now planning to make another fact finding trip to Georgia with this new information.

Currently living in New Jersey, Janet was a Find a Grave volunteer in the past. Periodically, she would check the website to see if someone might have found her grandmother’s grave. Unwittingly, that someone was me!

As I continued to correspond with Janet, she told me more about her family. She has given me permission to share their story here.

Francis and Carrie Turner lived in rural Tucker in 1910. Records indicate that Francis was born in Lumpkin County, Ga., although his parents were from South Carolina. Carrie grew up in Coweta County, Ga. There was a 25 year age difference between the two, but their union did produce four children. They had a set of male twins, a daughter and another son. Janet’s father was their youngest child.

Unfortunately, Carrie died of pneumonia in 1917 at the age of 40. Francis, then 65, was left with a daunting decision to make. He was poor and his own health was not very good. How was he going to take care of four young children, all of them under the age of 10? It’s a heart-breaking situation few of us would envy.

Ultimately, Francis took his children to the Baptist Children’s Home, then located in Hapeville. He entrusted his children to the care of the orphanage, where they grew up and started lives of their own. Out of the four Turner siblings, only Janet’s father and mother had children.

Janet and her siblings visited Georgia four years ago, hoping to find out more. They visited the Georgia Baptist Children’s Home, now in Palmetto, and found papers that proved the orphanage story was indeed true. She wrote:

[We] are presently in the process of finding out what we have to do legally to unite the twin brothers in one grave, they are in different cemeteries, since neither of them had children and are buried alone.  Every piece of the puzzle is so important and it is my life dream to find my grandmother’s family and my grandfather’s family to perhaps, with the grace of God, find a photo of them, and to reach out to what I believe could be a large family.

Janet and her family are now looking for a professional genealogist in Georgia to do the legwork in finding out more about her grandparents. I hope to be of use to them in some small way, if only to track down some documents locally. Hopefully, they will learn more about Carrie and the other Turners. I’m looking forward to meeting Janet and her siblings in person when they come to Georgia.

Sometimes I do question why I enjoy spending my time poking around in old graveyards. Taking photos while sidestepping ant hills and sweating under a hot Georgia sun (during the rare times it wasn’t raining this summer). I admit that when I was photographing this cemetery, it did cross my mind. Why on earth do I do this?

The answer is that I do it for people like Janet who are seeking answers to their family’s past. I am elated that by simply taking a picture, I helped her find her grandmother. I want to keep doing this. I love doing this!

I think that reason’s good enough for me.

I love to travel. Unfortunately, I’ve only been out of the country a few times. Now that I’m a hopper, it excites me to think of all the interesting cemeteries, I mean, places I’d like to visit.

My friend Todd Guenzi also has the travel bug, but he actually goes to the places that I dream of visiting. He’s a great photographer, too, so I get to enjoy seeing pictures of his adventures. One place he visits often is Puerto Rico, an island paradise I have on my “must go” list.

On one of his visits a few months ago, he had the chance to wander around a cemetery called Cementerio Isla Verde that’s practically on the beach. Pretty rare, indeed. When he sent me the pictures, I knew I was going to feature them here eventually.

This week, I’m simply going to post these pictures, paraphrasing Todd’s insights. I could not find much information on this cemetery and what I did see was in Spanish (definitely not my primary language). So my usual lengthy research didn’t result in anything worth sharing.

Here’s what Todd had to say:

“I was staying in a region of San Juan called Carolina, just east of San Juan. My hotel was on the beach and just about a half a mile up the beach to the west, you could see this cemetery from the beach (fenced from beach to cemetery). There was no access from beach to cemetery, but when I took the avenue walk on the other side, there was an entrance from the main road. So I was able to gain access that way.

Amazing to me that they took valuable beach front property to place a cemetery, but I suppose that is “modern” thinking. When this cemetery was developed, life was different, and there may have been more reverence for this entity. Long before the resorts and hotels were built.”

These photos leave more questions than answers but they offer a unique glimpse into a cemetery nestled in paradise. I would love to know the story behind this neglected place. I appreciate that Todd could share it with me so I could share it with you.

Is there a difference between a casket and a coffin?

This kind of question probably doesn’t keep you up at night. At the same time, funeral terminology can get confusing if you’re not familiar with it. That’s why this post will be the first installment in an occasional series called Death 101.

Coffin versus casket?

Today, the terms coffin and casket are used interchangeably. In the past, the term for the container people were buried in was called a coffin. Casket is now more commonly used. However, there are differences between the two.

The most obvious distinction is the shape. Coffins have either six or eight sides, either hexagonal or octagonal. Remember those old black and white horror films featuring vampires, zombies and other creatures of the night? Those are coffins being depicted.

Coffins are shaped that way to conform to the shape of the human body: narrow around the head, broad on the shoulders area and much narrower down to the feet. By contrast, caskets are rectangular and are what most people are familiar with. That’s what funeral homes sell now. I wonder if the increasing girth of the average American is one reason for the more (ahem) generous shape.

So why the change?

The term casket was initially used as a euphemism for a coffin when funeral parlors started replacing mortuaries. Coffin seemed offensive with the sense of finality that comes with it. But is casket that much better, you might ask? Years ago, yes.

The original meaning of casket was a box for keeping precious belongings like jewelry. Using “casket” to mean “coffin” was meant to diminish the negative connotation that comes with the burial container. Even the death care industry is aware of the value of good marketing.

This explains something I’d always wondered about in Charlotte Bronte’s novel, Jane Eyre. In it, governess Jane becomes engaged to her mysterious employer, Rochester. At the altar, she learns of a tiny complication that’s been living in Thornfield’s attic: Rochester’s insane wife, Bertha. Not eager to become a sister wife, Jane flees. Months later, she returns to find Thornfield burned to the ground, Bertha dead, and Rochester maimed and half-blind. He talks about when he realized she had left him:

After examining your apartment, [I] ascertained that you had taken no money, nor anything which could serve as an equivalent! A pearl necklace I had given you lay untouched in its little casket; your trunks were left corded and locked as they had been prepared for the bridal tour.

Another difference between the two is in materials. Coffins are usually very simple, made of wood, and often do not have handles or interiors. Even back when people were only beginning to adapt the practice of burying the dead in vessels, a cross right above the deceased’s head is the only adornment a coffin would have.

Coffins were almost always handcrafted by one person, often the local carpenter. It was he who would “undertake” the task of taking care of the final disposition of the deceased. That’s where the term “undertaker” comes from.

Caskets are typically made of softwood or hardwood, or 16, 18, or 20 gauge metal. In fact, most caskets purchased today are metal. They are often intricately designed and have engravings, imagery, gold or silver details, handles, and much more. Furthermore, caskets tend to have interiors made of silk, velvet, or other high-quality fabrics. They can also be incredibly expensive.

In America, caskets are made by a handful of large manufacturers. Two of them are Batesville and Aurora (both based in Indiana). The shells are often built on an assembly line, with the additional hardware and decorative elements added later. This is quite different from one carpenter building a simple wooden coffin by hand.

You can actually buy your own casket at places like Costco or BJ’s. They will ship it directly to the funeral home of your choice. This can save a good deal of money since the casket you might purchase from a funeral home is going to carry a markup in price. However, I did note that of the 37 states in which Costco sells and will deliver caskets to, Georgia is not one of them.

Casket manufacturers are feeling the pinch these days as the demand for cremation continues to rise. As a result, companies like Batesville are coming up with more options in the way of decorative containers and urns in which to place ashes.

At the same time, the need for caskets is never going to completely go away. There are too many religious issues attached to cremation for that to ever happen. But that’s a topic that deserves its own blog post another time.

As for me, I’m partial to the idea of a simple wooden coffin, not a casket. It brings to mind the lyrics from a song by Doug Stone:

I’d be better off in a pine box,
On a slow train back to Georgia,
Or in the grey walls of a prison doing time.

Then again, maybe not.

Like a lot of people, I spend way too much time on Facebook. But as a stay at home mom, I find it’s a good way to keep in touch with friends and family when I’m busy. One such person is a fellow high school classmate of mine, Sharon Smith Patterson.

Sharon was a year behind me in school but we were in Select Chorus together at Fayette County High School. We reconnected on Facebook and she heard about my obsession with all things cemetery. When she told me about a small cemetery near where she’d grown up and now lives with her husband and kids, all I needed to know was where and when.

We eventually found time to meet up in Peachtree City near the end of the school year before the weather go too insanely hot. She is just as cute and sweet as I remembered her to be, and does not look like the mother of two teen girls. To me, she looks exactly the same, if not better, than our high school days.

Sharon isn’t a native of Fayette County but she moved here with her family from Stone Mountain as a child. Her grandparents bought a tract of land between Fayetteville and Peachtree City. Sharon’s grandparents, father and aunt built homes and settled their families on the property, tucked far back in the woods. The long gravel/dirt road remains unpaved. As I drove down it behind Sharon’s car, I felt like I was stepping back in time to a day when families lived off the land and farming was the order of the day. Sharon’s dad operates his own Christmas tree farm along this road. So in a way, the tradition continues.

Despite the gate with the giant STOP sign on it and the very old “No Trespassing” signs, we took the short hike through the trees to what is called Davis Cemetery. (It’s also known as Phillips Cemetery, although there are no graves with that name on them.) Sharon told me that she and her family visited the cemetery many times over the years and had never encountered anyone telling them to leave. She can even remember, as a child, making a sandwich for lunch and taking it to eat in the cemetery one day.

While Davis Cemetery is deep in the country, it seems to be well taken care of. Most of the graves are in decent shape, although a few are broken. None of them were buried in leaves or brush. I’m sure the Fayette County Historical Society does a good job at keeping things in good order since this little piece of land is an important piece of history itself.

There are only three Davises buried there (although some graves could be unmarked), but the cemetery has several graves with the name Adams on them. That’s because Bennett Adams and his wife, Mary Spradlin Adams, had a total of 14 children. Some of them died in childhood and are buried there with Mary. But a number of them went on to live long lives. Several of them are buried in nearby Flat Creek and Hopewell Cemeteries. Bennett is buried in the former.

Born in South Carolina in 1827, Bennett moved to Fayette County as a child. He married Mary Spradlin in 1849. Bennett served in the Confederate Army, enlisting in August 1862 in the 7th Georgia Infantry, Company C. Later, he received a pension from the state for his service in the war. His brothers James, Trus and Elias also served.

According to a letter on Elias’ Find a Grave memorial, he had the sad task of informing his parents that his brother, Trus, was dead:

“I seat myself this evening to let you all know that I got to my company safe but I am not well. I found Trus a corps [sic]. I got there on the 16th and he was killed about a half an hour before I got to him. He never spoke a word. He was shot through the heart. It was about five o’clock in the evening he was killed. I buried him as good as I could just as he was killed in his blanket. He was killed at Calhoun and we had to retreat that night. Maw you don’t know what sort of a feeling that I had when I got there and found Trus dead. You need not be surprised to hear of me and Fayette going the same way.”

Bennett became the postmaster of Flat Creek in Fayette County in 1902. He outlived Mary and died at the ripe old age of 88.

As I mentioned earlier, five of Mary and Bennett’s children died young. The saddest story is of little Luella Adams, who died in 1860 at the age of four. According to her Find a Grave memorial, she died due to injuries from a fire. Only a month later, sister Margaret would die of typhoid at the age of six.

Another family touched by tragedy is buried in Davis Cemetery. Three brothers from the Johnson family served in the Civil War, but only one came home.

William Johnson’s monument stood alone for many years until 2007 when his descendants, along with the local Sons of Confederate Veterans groups, ordered grave stones for Samuel and John. The two served in the 53rd Georgia Infantry. One died of illness and one died in battle. William, the youngest of the three, returned after serving in the 13th Georgia Infantry. He died in 1875.

Sharon has heard stories that at one time, a plantation was located in the area. Some of the crude nameless fieldstones may be markers for slave graves but nobody knows for sure. Maybe they’re Davis graves.

All in all, my visit to Davis Cemetery and my reunion with Sharon were a true pleasure. I don’t know enough about Fayette County’s history, despite having lived there most of my life. By visiting this place and researching the lives of those buried here, I feel that I’ve started to remedy that.

In my last two blog posts, I described the wonders of one of the largest cemeteries I’ve ever visited. But in my opinion, tiny Davis Cemetery is just as important.

I think the Davis, Adams, and Johnson families would agree.

Last week, I shared some of Westview’s rich history and confessed my irrational fear of mausoleums. Now let’s take a look around the grounds and explore the lives of some of the more prominent Atlantans buried there.

One of Westview’s most famous residents is Southern author Joel Chandler Harris, known for his Uncle Remus stories. Born in Eatonton, Ga. in 1848, Harris was the illegitimate son of Irish immigrant Mary Ann Harris and grew up in relative poverty. At 17, he left school and got a job helping plantation owner Joseph Addison Turner with his newspaper The Confederate in exchange for clothing, room and board.

During these Civil War years, Harris often wandered down to the slave quarters during his time off. He was enthralled with the stories of people like Uncle George Terrell, Old Harbert, and Aunt Crissy. The African-American animal tales they shared later became the foundation and inspiration for Harris’s Uncle Remus tales.

Years later, Harris and his wife lived in Atlanta where he worked as an associate editor for the Atlanta Constitution. His West End home, the Wren’s Nest, is located a few miles from Westview and is now a museum and cultural center. Some people give Harris’ writing short shrift because they think his portrayal of African-Americans in his Uncle Remus stories is unflattering. However, even some African-American authors give Harris credit for sharing the rich slave oral history that few had heard before.

Disney’s portrayal of Harris’ stories in the 1946 Song of the South is still controversial. It’s one of Disney’s few films that isn’t available on DVD in the United States. Some copies are available in Europe and Japan, and they occasionally pop up on eBay.

Harris’ boss and eventual close friend Henry W. Grady is also buried at Westview. Grady only lived to the age of 39 but he was a strong voice at a time of rebuilding and renewal in Atlanta. He spoke his mind about where he thought the South was headed and gained the respect of many.

His name also graces the journalism school at the University of Georgia from which I obtained my bachelor’s degree in 1990. I learned how to hone my craft in those classrooms and found the courage to test my wings in the world of newspapers in Athens. While I do not agree with Grady’s racist leanings, I respect his vision for good writing. It’s something difficult to find in today’s news.

Another familiar Atlanta name is Robert Winship Woodruff, president of Coca-Cola from 1923 to 1954. His father purchased it from Asa Candler (who is also buried at Westview) in 1919. When the company faced financial difficulty, they elected Robert president, who was then 33. Over the next several years, with his guidance, Coca Cola became the worldwide entity it is known as today. He’s also known for his philanthropy efforts, having donated millions to Emory University. The Woodruff Arts Center, home of the Atlanta Symphony and Atlanta Opera, is named in his honor.

I have to share a story about one last famous Atlanta resident, Thomas R. Egleston, Jr. He founded Henrietta C. Egleston Children’s Hospital (now known as Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta), named after his mother. Henrietta had four children die at an early age. The hospital pioneered programs that directly involved parents in their child’s care, beginning with a policy of allowing parents to spend the night. The Egleston family monument is a lovely Celtic cross with carved seats on each side.

It was while I was snapping pictures of the monument that I made a most unusual discovery on one of the seats. Someone had clearly left (ahem) a most intimate article of clothing there.

Yep, it was a bra. I haven’t been cemetery hopping long but I’ve never found lingerie in a cemetery. It’s just not something I expected to find. I wondered if I should tell one of the many maintenance guys working on the property, but the thought of having to have that kind of conversation made me veto that option. Should I take it to the office? Ultimately, I decided to leave it right where it was so someone else could make that decision. It wasn’t going to be me!

One final monument attracted my attention for simply the fact that it fascinated me. The grave of Atlanta mercantile owner Stephen Andrew Ryan is marked with a large stone cross with a young woman seated at its base, the expression on her face a striking one. Ryan died in 1908, leaving behind a wife and a daughter, Edith, who was only 11 years old at the time. According to his obituary, he suffered from paralysis the last 12 months of his life.

I wonder if the woman represents Daisy, his wife, longing for the time she will join him. The look on her face is one of resignation, of waiting. I could not find a marker for Daisy or Edith. I wonder what happened to them, how they handled life after Stephen’s death.

In a way, that statue epitomizes what Westview is to me. Beautiful in many ways but a mystery in others. The quiet serenity of the Abbey chapel with its stained glass is a unique sight to behold. Unlike Oakland, which feels like an open book to me, Westview is an enigma I have yet to figure out. Maybe I’m not meant to.

But I’ll be back.