I’m ashamed to admit that it had been years since I last visited a cemetery, mostly because my parents, grandparents and all but a few other relatives are buried on Long Island.
A recent trip to the Gifford Cemetery made me feel even worse – for all of us.
There, as I walked the mowed-but-dusty grounds of the 49th Street cemetery, my emotions soared and sank as I found plenty of newer, well-marked and nicely maintained graves in some sections and too many older, sometimes-unmarked, grossly neglected graves in other sections.
It’s the memory of the disgraceful condition of those forgotten and seemingly forsaken burial sites that haunts me as I write this column.
“It’s something that everyone here wishes was better than it is,” local NAACP leader Tony Brown said. “But Gifford is a community with a whole bunch of needs that take priority over the wants.
“The cemetery gets caught between a need and a want.”
Certainly, the good people of Gifford, which lacks the affluence and influence of many other parts of our county, have more pressing needs than a spruced-up cemetery.
Anyone with a conscience, however, should want our neighbors to enjoy a more proper and dignified final resting place – something closer to the manicured, park-like setting at Crestlawn Cemetery, which is owned and operated by the city of Vero Beach.
“We maintain the property with the money we raise from selling the plots,” said Delores Hayes, spokesperson for the Gifford Cemetery Association, the non-profit group that operates the cemetery, where more than 2,000 people are buried. “But we price our plots so they’re affordable for the people of our community.”
Hayes refused to provide the current plot price, which she said is set by the cemetery association and is a one-time, up-front payment with no ongoing maintenance fees. Whatever it is, though, it’s obviously not enough.
During my hour-plus, afternoon stroll around the cemetery, I found headstones that were chipped, pitted, cracked, tilted, eroded and otherwise weather-beaten, so much so that the names or dates or both couldn’t be read.
Some headstones had large chunks broken off. Some had metal nameplates that were so rusted that the names weren’t legible. Others had stick-on lettering and numbers, some of which didn’t stick and have left the grave unidentified.
Many graves had no headstones, marked by only small metal plaques. Several were bordered by cinder blocks, some of which were cracked and chipped. A few were littered with the remnants of pottery and pieces of wood.
Some older graves had no headstones, no plaques, no markings at all.
What was especially troubling was seeing that several of the older graves hadn’t been tended to – other than regular mowing – in years, maybe decades. Grass and weeds had grown over the concrete slabs, some of which were covered with ant hills, pine needles and fallen tree branches.
And remember: It was less than five years ago that the cemetery association faced harsh criticism from Gifford residents who were horrified when nearly 22 inches of October rain flooded the cemetery and unearthed several of the concrete vaults containing caskets.
“We’ve worked very hard to improve the cemetery, and we’re still working hard,” Hayes said. “We’ve been working with the Indian River Genealogical Society, going through every row and trying to identify each grave. Family members can go to a website and find exactly where their loved ones are buried, and the project is not complete.
“We have a paid position to maintain the property, and we’ve also had volunteers from the community come out and help us,” she added. “We’re very thankful to the people who have bought beautiful new headstones that enhance the appearance of the cemetery.
“We’re not ignoring anything, but there’s only so much we can do if the family members don’t take care of the individual graves.”
That, it appears, is at least part of the problem.
What if there are no living family members? What if there are no family members still living in the area? What if the surviving family members can’t – or don’t want to – visit the cemetery?
Who takes care of those graves?
Based on what I saw: Nobody.
That’s undoubtedly the case for the graves containing people whose identities remain a mystery. Nobody knows who’s buried in them and nobody seems to care enough to claim them.
“There are some unknowns buried there,” Hayes said. “The Genealogical Society did a study of all the cemeteries in Indian River County in 1987, and they were unable to identify them then. So unless family members come forward, we might never know who they are.”
That’s understandable, given that the cemetery’s earliest recorded interment was in 1922, nearly 20 years before the state deeded the property to a local American Legion post as a burial ground for black military veterans.
There are currently 122 veterans buried there, Hayes said.
Surely, they deserve better. So do the civilians – men, women, children and even unnamed babies – who were laid to rest decades ago. So does the Gifford community.
“If people want to come out and help us with the cemetery, we’d be glad to have the help,” Hayes said.
Anyone interested in volunteering can contact Hayes by phone at 772-567-8871 or write the Gifford Cemetery Association at P.O. Box 2492, Vero Beach, FL, 32961.
In the meantime, Brown said he’ll try to rally the Gifford community to the cause.
“I think writing about this and trying to get people to help is an awesome idea,” Brown said. “Now that you’re calling attention to the situation, maybe we can get something done.”
This needs to be done – as a matter of dignity, respect and pride – and we all should want to help, just as we’ve answered the call of our community so many times before.
Sprucing up the Gifford Cemetery will make this county a better place to live. It might also make you feel better about yourself.
