Cemeteries + more Waymarking talk

No Trespassing

I can't begin to tell you how much I like this photo. I don't know why. I guess with the ridiculousness of xenophobia and immigration, it just seems appropriate.

I went to two cemeteries today. It would have been three but the third was in a different spot than I thought it would be. I should have really Google Earth'd the location before I set out so I wasn't basing my direction on a general location.

Lt. Carl Bailey Cemetery - weathered tomb

Lt. Carl Bailey Cemetery, formerly Cleveland Cemetery, is located in the Cleveland neighbourhood of Punta Gorda. It's well-kept now. The older graves - the ones that are marked, that is - show extreme weathering and neglect. The place is modestly big for being in a small square of town. The number of occupants are impressive and there are still plots for sale. It's an active cemetery. It was renamed Lt. Carl Bailey Cemetery after the U.S. Air Force lieutenant who is buried, along with his whole family, in the cemetery.

Hickory Bluff Cemetery

Hickory Bluff Cemetery is named appropriately because when the cemetery began in the 1800's, Charlotte Harbor Town was still known as Hickory Bluff. This was a time before DeSoto County even existed and the entire area was a giant Manatee County. This was another neglected cemetery where people were buried without markers or record from the 1800's until the 1950's. Charlotte County had charge of maintaining the cemetery in the 1930's and 40's but did nothing to resolve this substantial problem. There are three markers with full information provided. Three. Out of the countless others who were buried in the seventy years from the 1880's through the 1950's. I ran audio at Hickory Bluff but it resulted in nothing. I did get fantastic photographs of the birds who weren't afraid of people. They treated me like I wasn't even there.

Did I mention both Lt. Carl Bailey Cemetery and Hickory Bluff Cemetery were for African-American residents? I think the County should exume and identify, but where does that money come from? Still, I think it needs to be done and should be done on the County dollar since it was the County who perpetuated this problem. It shouldn't stay the way it is.

I have to do laundry and pack tomorrow for this trip. Tom's making me "prepare" instead of letting me throw everything together last minute. Since I'm staying in Rensselaer for the week, I have to pack more clothes than I did when I ran back and forth during the Winter visitation thing. Rensselaer currently has one waymark so I'm going to have a ball waymarking all the historical and noteworthy everything. The peer vote on my Woman's Clubs category will be done on May 29. I'll be on the road, which doesn't make a difference in the category's fate but it will drive me crazy until I know what's going on.