Requiem For A Friend, Willie Elwood Isaac, 1928--2023

 

Willie Isaac and his new car--Photo by Cakes For You and Roger D. Hicks

My neighbor for the past 30 years was Willie Isaac who lived nearly his entire life on a small hillside farm about a mile and a quarter from my house.  He was born in 1928 and died in 1923 about one month before what would have been his 95th birthday.  Willie and I had known each other ever since I moved to this community in 1992 although we did not become close friends until  after his wife, Flora Cook Isaac, died in October of 2018 after 66 years of marriage.  Willie and I had frequently encountered each other in our home town of West Liberty, Kentucky, at local stores and other public places.  We had always been friendly but not close until a couple of weeks before Flora died and I saw Willie's truck parked in the local ARH Hospital parking lot and inquired if he or his wife were in the hospital.  I visited them there as he stayed by her side during her final hospitalization and transfer to a nursing home where she actually died a few days later.  But I had known for about three or four years that her health was failing and Willie was taking care of her diligently, cleaning the house, mowing the yard, and driving her to her appointments.  He had finally stopped driving a couple of years before his death and, although he had no children, his nephew Jimmie Wireman had selflessly driven him to all his medical appointments, bought his groceries, took him to his bank and to the local utility companies to pay his bills.  Willie had finally stopped mowing his own lawn at about the age of 90 and Jimmy had taken care of that also.  But Willie had continued to maintain contact with his widely diverse group of local friends and extended family until about three weeks before his death. He spent a large part of most days on the telephone talking to his relatives and friends. He had continued to live alone with support from Jimmy and his wife Brenda Smith, and I also assisted him at times with minor tasks once in a while, almost daily contact in person or by phone, and one occasion when I had assisted him in getting back up after a fall in his living room.  Amazingly, until just a few days before his death, Willie had maintained his cognitive capacities and still had conversations with Jimmie, Brenda, and I as we visited him in the hospital during his final three week stay due to kidney failure.  Sadly, Jimmie, who was 79 himself, only lived about 9 months after Willie's death.  But he had managed to complete the job of caring for his uncle's needs before his death. 

Willie Isaac, about 1951--Photo by Willie Isaac & Roger Hicks

Willie and Flora had no children other than a son whom Flora had before they married and adopted to a couple from the area who lived in Ohio and raised him.  After Flora died, Willie continued to live in the little three bedroom brick house he built many years ago and where they had operated a used shoe and clothing business for more than forty years.  As a trained and retired mental health professional, I was worried that Willie would suffer from the grief, loss of socialization, and loneliness which often afflicts the elderly following the death of a long term spouse.  So I had begun to visit him regularly.  It turned out he actually had a fairly large support system for a man his age with no children.  He had two nephews who lived in the area and they visited him regularly as did several members of the church  he attended weekly until he stopped driving.   A previous minister of that church also visited with him frequently until his own untimely death due to suicide.  He had a few friends and a sister who also called him nearly every day to check on him. But that sister also died in July 2021 at the age of 100 almost three years before Willie's death. We had developed a system quite informally where I either visited him or called him at least every day or two. At times, Willie would also call me to remind me of a UK basketball game or some other issue in which he knew I was interested.  Since I knew that he was having regular contact with several others, I didn't always visit or call every day but we stayed closely in touch and I made sure he knew that he was free to call me anytime he might be in need of assistance.  

Willie Isaac, Korea, photo by Willie Isaac & Roger Hicks

Not long ago he brought out a collection of photographs which he and others took during his time in the Korean War in 1950-1952.  He agreed to allow me to post them on this blog although he had never used the internet and didn't have a clear idea of exactly how a blog works.  But his mind was still sharp until shortly before his death.  He loved University of Kentucky basketball, watched every game which was available on his limited plan with Dish Network, and read every issue of "The Cats Pause".  He also maintained subscriptions to the local newspapers in both Morgan and Magoffin counties in Kentucky because he had friends in both counties and lived within sight of the county line.  His memory was well above average for a man his age and he loved to talk about his life, extended family, and his years spent "in the shoe business".  He and Flora had built a little building in the edge of their yard on US 460 and sold used clothing and shoes for over 40 years. Willie would drive as far as Columbus, Ohio, to buy a pickup load of shoes and clothing at a large Goodwill sorting center and also often bought large lots of new shoes from shoe stores which were either reducing unsold stock or going out of business. He also managed at some time during their selling days to buy a used shoe repair machine and also repaired shoes and other leather work both for his own sales and for customers in need of repairs.  He eventually sold the shoe shop equipment to one of his nephews after he and Flora had stopped their selling activity. I actually have met dozens of people in this community who talk about having gotten nearly all their shoes from Willie and Flora as they were growing up. And after I posted this blog post, one person commented on Facebook that he had bought all his shoes for many years from Willie.  And, interestingly, he also said that Willie had cut hair at times and only charged a quarter for a hair cut.  But, in all the time I knew him, Willie never mentioned cutting hair to me.  My first blog post about Willie was primarily about his service in the US Army during the Korean War and the stories Willie had told me about his time in the Army  during the Korean War.  First and foremost, Willie always made a point of saying that he was attached to an engineering unit which built bridges and roads during the war.  He always said "nobody ever fired a shot at me and I never fired a shot at anybody" since the engineering unit he was assigned to was always working behind the front building roads and bridges.  He also talked sometimes about one R & R episode he spent in Japan during his Korean duty but he apparently had no photographs from that trip.  Willie did have a few photographs of other soldiers some of whom he remembered their names and some he did not.  I have added the names he either remembered or wrote on the photos. Some will have to be nameless.  But maybe some of their relatives might recognize them and I will add their names if you recognize a member of your family in his photos and contact me on this blog.  Willie also never mentioned a unit name and number for his engineering unit but a retired Army person I know says that it might have been the 103rd Engineer Regiment.  If you have a definite answer other than this please tell me what it was and I will add that to this post also until we can come up with a more indisputable answer.   

Walter H. Handley, Alabama--Photo by Willie Isaac and Roger Hicks

 

 

 

One of the photographs is of a local man who also was assigned to the same unit and Willie now says that man is dead.  Here is his photograph as identified by Willie. 

Bill Ison, Crockett, KY--Photo by Willie Isaac & Roger Hicks

Willie also loved to tell a story of being classified as a truck driver during his time in Korea.  He said "They told us they were giving us driver education and we were in a classroom for about a half a day.  Then we went out in a parking lot and had to drive a truck around the parking lot one time and they let us go."  Later he says, "One day my sergeant came to me and told me to report to the motor pool.  I asked why do I have to go to the motor pool and the sergeant said 'They need a truck driver and you are a truck driver."   Willie says he told the sergeant, "I'm not a truck driver.  I never drove a truck in my life."  He says the sergeant said, "It says right here you are a truck driver.  It's in your record.  You're a truck driver."  Willie said he reported to the motor pool and they put him in a big truck and told him to drive twenty or thirty miles down a river to pick up supplies.  He said, "I tried to tear the transmission out of the truck on the way there but I couldn't."  He also saidnnb that on the way back to his unit he met two men in a jeep whom the motor pool had sent out looking for him afraid that he had driven the truck into the river.  But when the entire thing was over, Willie was a truck driver and was proud enough of it that he sent the photograph below to his parents with the caption, "This is my truck."  It seems most likely that the truck Willie drove was a 2 1/2 ton truck commonly known as a Deuce And A Half. 

The Truck Willie Drove--Photo by Willie Isaac and Roger Hicks

Being able to survive driving the truck apparently got Willie a promotion since he also sent home a photograph of another soldier driving a jeep and added the caption, "This is the jeep I used to drive."  

"Hauser from Alabama" driving the Jeep Willie used to drive--Photo by Willie Isaac and Roger Hicks

Willie also sent home a few photographs of himself with other soldiers whom he could not name or simply did not write their names on the shots including this one below.  It might be "Hauser from Alabama" since they are standing behind a large flat bed truck.  

Willie Isaac & Baker from Central or Western KY--Photo by Willie Isaac and Roger Hicks

Willie was assigned to a bridge building unit and also took a few photographs of a bridge they were building over an unnamed Korean river including the next two, one with an unnamed soldier in it.  Willie told a story that his unit was getting their water from the river a mile or so below this bridge and "one day after they pumped a truck load of water they found five dead Korean bodies in the water upstream above where they were pumping the water."  He said that he tried to not drink anymore water for several days after that.  He also always said that he hated rice and would never eat it after his time in Korea.  He said that the Korean civilians which worked for the US Army would "roll rice up in balls about the size of a softball and walk around eating that rice all day long.  I couldn't stand to eat rice after seeing that."  One of his favorite foods was boiled chicken feet and as long as he was able to do his own grocery shopping and cooking he would go to Wal Mart and buy multiple packages of fresh chicken feet and freeze them.  At his funeral visitation, several people and I wound up talking and laughing about Willie's love of chicken feet and I was the only one besides the deceased minister who ever admitted to having eaten chicken feet with Willie.  I had actually been present at Willie's one day when that minister was sitting at the kitchen table eating chicken feet.  Honestly, I never really cared for the feet but my mother had eaten them with gusto and I figured I owed her and Willie the one honest effort I made to eat them.  Willie also talked often about how in his young days his family frequently went opossum hunting and ate a lot of opossum which few people eat or hunt today.  Willie also loved turtle and in the first years of our acquaintance while he was still able to clean a turtle I would sometimes catch female common snapping turtles crossing the highway to lay their eggs and catch them and give them to Willie.  He never turned one down until he became too physically weak for the job.  I also love turtle but I hate to clean them so I quit eating them many years ago. 

Bridge Over An Unamed Korean River With An Unnamed Soldier--Photo by Willie Isaac and Roger D. Hicks

The photo below, although unlabeled, is of Willie Isaac in front of what appears to be a mess tent.   Since it is a tent, I have to assume it is also from Korea.  

Willie Isaac In Front Of A Mess Tent--Photo by Willie Isaac and Roger Hicks

When Willie returned from Korea, he spent some time at Fort Knox, Kentucky, and eventually left the Army in 1952. He was discharged from Fort Knox at the end of his hitch. He still had his discharge in a frame hanging in one bedroom of his home until the day of his death.  He also had one photograph of himself in what appeared to be a barracks building at Fort Knox with a friend but did not remember that man's name.  

Willie Isaac and a fellow soldier at Fort Knox 1952--Photo by Willie Isaac and Roger D. Hicks

 

Willie also sent home one photograph from Korea of what he described as "an 8" gun".  Maybe somebody with military experience can tell me exactly what this weapon was called.  

"8 inch gun"--Photo by Willie Isaac and Roger Hicks

 

Despite my fears about Willie after the death of his wife, he managed remarkably well for a nonagenarian widower living alone in Eastern Kentucky.  He did his own laundry until he was past 90 and his nephew Jimmy's wife, Brenda took over that job and also began bringing him home cooked meals regularly, At some time past 90, he got out a small steam cleaner he owned and steam cleaned his carpets.  He also adopted and took care of a stray dog who showed up at his house and ate the food he offered but wouldn't let him touch it.  The dog, a pit bull cross female, seemed to have a serious history of abuse but I have seen her follow Willie in his yard and dart from behind him just close enough to brush a hand in passing.  I also never saw anyone besides Willie ever get close to her before she died. One of Willie's favorite photographs was an old black and white shot of himself and a long dead brother in their yard as boys with a favorite dog from his childhood. He loved dogs but always said he didn't like cats and "never owned a cat in my life".  He drove to church every Sunday as long as he was able and did his regular trips to town for groceries, medical visits, and bill paying in his brand new car he bought a few weeks after his wife Flora was buried.  

 

He loved words and had a strong vocabulary for a relatively uneducated man in Eastern Kentucy and kept several dictionaries.  He had actually returned to high school in the 1940's to graduate as he had promised his mother when he dropped out for a year to follow an older brother to Ohio to work.  It was an incredibly rare event in 1940's Eastern Kentucky for a young male to return to school after having dropped out.  He kept a wooden chair on his back porch which he had built in a high school shop class and given to his father.  He pointed out to me a groove in the right arm of that chair which he said had been made by his father's habit of sitting in the chair smoking his pipe and lighting it with kitchen matches which he always struck on the chair arm in the same spot for many years. He was also proud of having used some of the first pay he ever earned in a regular job to buy his mother her first washing machine.  Shortly after his marriage to Flora, they had ordered on the same order from the Sears and Roebuck catalogue a sewing machine for Flora and a single shot, bolt action rifle for Willie.  He still had the rifle at his death and had killed thousands of squirrels with it on the farm which he inherited from his parents.  

 

To say the least, I think about Willie every day and will miss our friendship as long as I live.  This is a photo of the tombstone which Willie and Flora paid for along with their funerals several  years before Flora's death.  Willie's date of death has not been inscribed on the monument yet but you can bet that Brenda Smith and I will see to that it  gets done sometime soon.  They are buried in a little family cemetery which is located on Willie's family farm and holds the graves of Willie's parents, a few of his siblings, and a lot of his friends and neighbors including a few of my other neighbors in this community who have died since I moved here thirty years ago.  Willie, who owned the cemetery property never refused to allow anyone to be buried on the cemetery and had even allowed some people he knew in Magoffin County to have an unmarried friend of theirs buried on the cemetery.  Sadly, his grave is still only marked with the common metal temporary marker which funeral homes use at the time of a burial.  

 

 

"Decoration Day In The Mountains: Traditions Of Cemetery Decoration In The Southern Appalachians" by Alan Jabbour & Karen Singer Jabbour--Reflections On A Wonderful Book

 Over the last few months, I have written on this blog about several wonderful books which I have deliberately strayed into or sought out on purpose.  I was so pleased with this one when I bought it and it arrived that I mentioned it in an earlier blog post based solely on having scanned the wonderful photograps it contains which were shot by Karen Singer Jabbour as her primary, but not her only, contribution to this book with her husband Alan Jabbour. 

Alan Jabbour worked in several high level capacities for the federal government including as head of the Archive of Folk Song at the Library of Congress, director of the Folk Arts Program at the National Endowment for the Arts, and director of the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress. The Jabbours completed the research for this book over several years primarily in the area of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park but also did extensive research in Kentucky, Tennessee, West Virginia, and Virginia.  It is fascinating to me that Alan Jabbour was the son of immigrants and produced such an incredible book about folk culture and folk life in Central and Southern Appalachia.  The book was published by the University of North Carolina Press in 2010 but I had not known of it until recently.  It is the best book about burials and burial practices in Central and Southern Appalachia since James K. Crissman's "Death and Dying In Central Appalachia" came out in 1994.  

The Jabbour's focused their first research on several cemeteries which are located in the North Shore area of Fontana Lake which lies within the boundaries of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  These cemeteries are unaccessible by land except for what could be miles of hiking in the mountains or by crossing the lake on a boat from landings on the south shore.  The National Parks Service decided at some point after the lake was built to accommodate people who wished to attend what had always been annual "Decoration Day" at these cemeteries by providing a pontoon boat operated by Parks Service staff which would transport the people, their cemetery decorations, and food for dinner on the grounds.  The Jabbour's attended the first Decoration Day on the day when a new park superintendent chose to attend the ceremony also which had never been done by his predecessors.  The boat actually had to make three trips in each direction across the lake due to the number of people.  The Jabbour's crossed on the first boat load and returned on the last boat load in able to document the arrivals and departures of the community members attending the ceremony which consisted of the annual cleanup of the cemeteries, placement of flowers and other decorations on the graves, a church service, and dinner on the grounds.  The photographs by Karen Singer Jabbour and the text by Alan Jabbour are thorough, highly informative, and enlightening about Decoration Day in Western North Carolina.  

It should be noted that Decoration Day is not necessarily on the same day as Memorial Day and is often set on other days in all the states of the Central and Southern Appalachian region.  In small localities, it is also often arranged so that Decoration Day does not conflict with the event on other local cemeteries since many people have relatives buried on several nearby cemeteries.  As a result of their work at these first two cemeteries, the Jabbours were able to meet and come to know many of the attendees and were invited to Decoration Day on numerous cemeteries within a large geographic area.  They shot photographs, recorded interviews, and made extensive notes as they traveled from cemetery and community to others in this large area.  

They did an excellent job of photographing and discussing different practices in the use of tombstones, grave markers, grave decorations, types of church services, and varying local customs in many areas of dealing with death and burial.  I cannot say enough good things about their work and their book.  They discuss and provide excellent photographs of a practice I had never seen before called "raking and mounding" of graves in which the grave has no grass growing on it but is, instead, raked clean and the dirt is mounded on top just as it would be immediately after a burial until the freshly dug earth settles.  But in that area of North Carolina, this practice is done long term as a way of maintaining graves cleanly and with dignity.  They also discuss and provide photographs of another practice which is not common in all areas of Central and Southern Appalachia which is covering graves with white sand or gravels instead of grass.  They provide only one photograph of a grave house which is a shame but they are not common in the Western North Carolina area.  But they provide several photographs of handmade field stone grave markers, some of which are very large and complex.  The provide several excellent photographs of shelters, pulpits, and seating equipment on cemeteries used both for the church services and dinner on the grounds.  These seating and roofed areas are more common all across Appalachia.  The book has 32 color photographs from probably a dozen or more cemeteries in a central section of the book on high quality stiff, slick paper.  But every chapter has at least a few black and white photographs, some with more than a dozen, of graves, shelters, entire cemeteries, church services, and other items and events.  This is the best book I have ever read about cemeteries in Central and Southern Appalachia.  It is beautiful blend of high quality photography, professional folk lore documentation, and very professional writing.  Nearly every discussion of a practice, item, or event has an insertion directing the reader to the appropriate photographs which document the practice, item, or event.  This book is well worth the price of admission if you have any interest in cemeteries either in Central and Southern Appalachia or elsewhere.  

I grew up near three cemeteries in Knott County Kentucky and attended many burials, Decoration Days, grave diggings, and cemetery clean ups in both Kentucky and West Virginia.  I also, for one year, supervised juvenile offenders in mowing and maintaining a historic cemetery in Franklin, Pennsylvania.  I have documented, photographed, and created memorials on the website Find A Grave for many cemeteries in Kentucky and other areas.  This book is a masterpiece especially if you have prior knowledge or interest in Appalachian cemeteries.  It is also a great book to own and read if you simply want to learn more about these practices from the viewpoint of a novice.  You will enjoy this book tremendously if you know or want to know anything about Appalachia and Appalachian people. 

Cemetery Traipsin' With Alexander Allen--September 5, 2019

Roger D. Hicks At Collins Cemetery--Photo by Alexander Allen

Yesterday, September 5, 2019, I spent a large part of the day doing what I like to call cemetery traipsin' with Alexander Allen in Floyd and Knott Counties in Eastern Kentucky.  Alex is a distant cousin on the Allen side of my family, only in his early twenties, and actually very interested in and actively involved in local history, family history, and genealogy.  It is highly encouraging and positive to see anyone Alex's age who is this interested in these issues of genealogy and historic preservation.  I think I know a lot about the cemeteries of Eastern Kentucky, some in Southern West Virginia, and a few others scattered over a few other states.  I have personally added more than 3,000 memorials to Find A Grave and photographed more than 650 graves for the website.  As my Find A Grave profile states, I have wandered through cemeteries in a great deal of the country and grew up within sight of three in Knott County. But I have to admit that Alex, especially for his age, has a large store of knowledge about cemeteries in Eastern Kentucky. Alex and I were going to some cemeteries each of us know well but neither of us knew all of them or all of the necessary information about them. We intended to take each other to a few which were important to both of us and share some information about them and the people buried there.  We started at the Manns-Allen Cemetery on Steele's Creek near Wayland in Floyd County.  This cemetery is located on a fairy high point on the left side of Steele's Creek about a mile and a half up the creek from Wayland and less than a half mile from the place where my parents operated a country store from 1945 to 1957 before moving to a new store at Dema on Beaver Creek in Knott County. It is at the mouth of a little hollow, which so far as I know has no name, and is the location where a couple named Bill and Goldie Stegall lived for many years.  I lived the first six years of my life on Steele's Creek and I had never been on that cemetery.  I do not remember ever being told that several members of our extended family were buried there.  What is a real shame about it is the fact that my maternal great-grandmother Hester Allen is buried there.  For the first time in my life, I visited the grave of my great-grandmother.  That cemetery is becoming badly overgrown and one section of it does not appear to have been mowed or cleaned up in many years.  At least one tree has fallen over a couple of graves. Another grave has a grape vine growing out of it and the base of the vine is nearly as big as my wrist.  Alex says he has dealt with the Floyd County Judge Executive recently about another cemetery and that official will sometimes send county inmates to clean up cemeteries.  Alex also states that each cemetery has to be placed on a list and they are done on a first come, first served basis which is the appropriate policy for such work.  Another friend has also told me recently that Floyd County inmates are also used sometimes to dig graves for families which cannot afford to pay for graves to be dug and I witnessed that practice not long ago when the nephew of some friends died whose parents were quite poor.  That issue of paying to dig graves irks me and always will.  I was an adult before I ever saw anybody paid to dig a grave in Eastern Kentucky.  When I was growing up, the family, friends, and neighbors always dug graves and nearly everyone would have considered it to be a travesty for anyone to accept money for such work. I would go so far as to say that most of the adults I knew in my childhood would have assisted in digging a grave for their avowed enemies if the need arose.  In that time and place, they would have done the work and never uttered one negative word about the person with whom they had disagreed in life.  

Ella Hicks Tombstone, Collins Cemetery--Photo by Alexander Allen

We traveled further up Beaver Creek beyond Wayland to the Collins Cemetery #1 which is located on the west side of Beaver Creek about a mile below the Knott County line.  I have known about this cemetery all my life and can remember a time when it was clearly visible from the highway nearly an eighth of a mile away on the other side of the creek.  But neither Alex or I had ever been on this cemetery despite the fact that both of us have family members and others we have known about buried in this spot.  It is a large cemetery with more than a hundred graves on it.  One hundred and thirty six graves on this cemetery have actually been documented on Find A Grave but I suspect that there are probably several more which were missed by the person who did most of those memorials.  This cemetery sits well up on the hillside and, if it were in good shape, commands an incredible view of a sizeable section of Right Beaver Creek with large mountains in every direction, no visible strip mine damage, obvious evidence of elk in the area which also means there has to be other wild game population, and the scene is generally quiet and peaceful without a great deal of noise from the visible highway.  When I say that the Manns-Allen Cemetery is "badly overgrown", that statement does not hold a light to the deplorable condition of the Collins Cemetery.  At one time, it was considered a major non-commercial public cemetery along the Beaver Creek, Floyd and Knott county border area and many outstanding members of the community have been buried there over the last one hundred years or more.  But today the cemetery is at best a briar patch with trees growing randomly all over the area and jungle might be a more apt descriptor.  The cemetery has a still functional chain link fence around it which is in good condition.  But elk are bedding down in the brush all over the cemetery. There are several monuments which have been turned over and one or two are broken.  I suspect that elk may have caused most of this damage since all livestock and wild animals will sometimes need to scratch themselves on the first available solid object.  A tall grave marker is no fitting scratching post for an elk weighing more than 500 pounds. It also appears that at one time someone had installed an electric fence charger in the vain hope that it would deter the elk from entering the cemetery.  But even if the electric was functional, the elk would simply raise their front ends and launch themselves over the fence. I actually stepped into a grave that was sunken to about knee depth because I was working my way around the cemetery and wending my way through briars, weeds, grapevines, and other brush which was over my head in many places.  I was pushing and weaving my way through a large mat of vegetation and literally pushed through and before I could see where I was I had stepped into the sunken grave up to my knees.  That one grave was the only one we found which was noticeably sunken although more could be hidden in the brush patches into which we never waded. 

Edgar Hicks Tombstone--Photo by Alexander Allen

Alex and I slowly worked our way through the majority of the cemetery and found probably most of the graves which are marked with formal granite or marble markers.  But we also frequently stumbled over semi-sunken sandstone markers for graves which might or might not be susceptible to rubbing in order to learn who is buried in them. Most of these sandstone markers have slowly sunk into the earth and little is visible of many of them. I have never done rubbing on grave markers and I realize that I should attempt to learn.  But, in spite of all these problems with brush, briars, and trees, both Alex and I were able to find some graves which were important to us.  I was able to locate the graves of my maternal aunt and uncle, Ella and Edgar Hicks, who had died tragically as children.  Just a few days before she would have turned three, my aunt Ella woke up one frosty October morning in 1922, just 11 days before what would have been her third birthday, and backed up against the hearth catching her nightgown on fire.  She died as a result of severe burns.  I had heard the story dozens of times as a child but I do not remember ever being told where she and my uncle Edgar were buried.   My uncle Edgar died at the age of ten in 1936 of what I always heard described as "a fever".  He had apparently been perfectly healthy until just a few days before his death.  My mother, the firstborn of my grandparents' children, was 22 years old when her brother Edgar died. She had been 8 when her little sister Ella died.  I am glad to say that I have finally been able to visit their graves.

Roger D. Hicks at the graves of Ella and Edgar Hicks--Photo by Alexander Allen

After we left the Collins Cemetery, Alex and I traveled further up Beaver Creek to Dema to visit the Turner Cemetery where both of us have several members of our extended family buried.  I grew up within sight of this cemetery, played on it with my friends as a child, attended traditional Old Regular Baptist Memorial Meetings there, and was first exposed there to the fine old Appalachian tradition of digging graves without pay for family, friends, neighbors, and total strangers.  I often refer to one old man, Alonzo "Lonzo" Bradley, I knew who lived his entire life on a hillside farm between the Turner Cemetery, the Pigman and Slone Cemetery, and the Collins Cemetery and always appeared in front of a deceased person's house the morning after they died with his tools in his hands ready to help dig the grave.  I often say that I have seen that old man insist that a grave be perfect, absolutely vertical and rectangular, without odd projections or holes in its walls, and dug with respect for the dead.  He firmly believed that the last decent and respectful thing we the living can do for the dead is to provide them with a perfectly dug grave which has been rendered with love and respect. I have seen that old man use his drinking water and dirt from the grave to make mud balls to fill holes in the sides of a grave where a rock had fallen out or been removed.  I will always remember him in his bib overalls with an old crumpled hat on his head climbing in and out of a grave until it perfectly suited his expectations. If good works and charity can get anyone into Heaven, you can rest assured that Lonzo Bradley is there resting from digging hundreds of graves for his neighbors and friends over his 76 years.

Alex had visited the Turner Cemetery but did not have much of the personal information I have about the individuals who are buried there.  I had personally known the majority of people who have been buried there over the last sixty years.  Alex and I started at the gate and walked the entire cemetery and I told him the stories I know about the people buried there.  The cemetery contains the graves of three very significant preachers in the Old Regular Baptist Church: E. Hawk Moore whom I have written about on this blog; Clabe Mosley, who lived to be 102 whom I have also written about, and who is perhaps the most famous Old Regular Baptist preacher in the history of the denomination; and, Hawley Warrens who lived within sight of the cemetery and was also a significant preacher in the denomination.  I suspect I will also eventually write a blog post about what I remember of Hawley Warrens. 

Turner Cemetery Sign--Photo by kestryll on Find A Grave 

As we were leaving the cemetery, we encountered Roy Huff and his wife, Priscilla Gail "Dockey" Huff, who do the lawn mowing and care of the cemetery and have done so for about twenty years.  Let me state for the record that this cemetery is always in excellent condition compared to most non-commercial cemeteries in Appalachia.  Roy does an excellent job despite the fact that he is nearly 80 and has had coronary bypass surgery.  Roy and Dockie do this work year in and year out, receiving only donations, and completing the work regardless of the income they may or may not receive for it. In many ways, Roy Huff has stepped into the empty shoes of Lonzo Bradley.  They say they mow the cemetery roughly a half dozen times a year.  And if you have read about the previous two cemeteries we visited on this day, you know that this is an exception.  If you know this cemetery, have loved ones buried there, or simply want to do a good deed, send them a check at the address on the sign in the photo below.  I can assure you the money will be used for the good of the cemetery and Roy and Dockie are completely honest.  I have known them since 1957.  We talked outside the cemetery near my truck for probably fifteen minutes before we left them to do their work.

One interesting portion of the talk which Alex and I had with Roy and Dockie was an almost verbatim repeat of a conversation which I had with Alex only minutes before.  I had been telling Alex about an incredible, perhaps two hundred year old oak tree which used to grow in the center of the cemetery and eventually died and was cut down.  It grew near four graves at the highest point of the cemetery which are only marked with rocks.  One of those graves is outlined with cut stones which are very similar in size, shape, and cut to the classic hand cut stone steps we often see at old mountain homes.  The other three have only large sandstone rocks on them.   When I was growing up, the prevalent tale in the area was that this grave with the cut rocks was "the grave of an old Indian".  Today I know better.  Native Americans did not bury their dead in that fashion.  What I had been telling Alex was that no one in my lifetime had ever been able to make a statement about who the four people buried in those graves might have been.  During our discussion with Roy and Dockie, Roy suddenly and spontaneously brought up that magnificent old oak tree and the four graves near it.  He went on to tell Alex virtually the same story I had only minutes earlier.  He also holds a view similar to mine that those people must actually be some of the first white settlers in the area of Dema and were probably the first people ever buried in the Turner Cemetery.

After we left the cemetery, we traveled to Garrett, Kentucky, and had lunch at the Garrett Fountain which serves mostly sandwiches, fries, and onion rings. The food is acceptable but not outstanding.  Then we went back to Glo and I visited with Alex's maternal grandfather Sam Bradley for awhile before heading back home.   

Clabe Mosley, Old Regular Baptist Preacher, Feb 1857-- May 1959

Clabe Mosley's Homemade Tombstone--Photo by Jim Spencer on Find A Grave

Although I was only eight years old when Clabe Mosley died in Knott County Kentucky, I will always remember the hundreds of stories I heard about him and his life as an Old Regular Baptist Preacher in the New Salem Association of Old Regular Baptists.  For most of the last years of his life, he lived in a small house behind the home of one of his relatives at Topmost on Right Beaver Creek.  But for many years before he died his handmade wooden keyhole casket and the cotton batting with which it was to be lined hung from the joists in the attic of my maternal grandfather, Woots Hicks, at Dema just below the Turner Cemetery where Clabe was eventually buried.  As I remember the story, at some point after he was past seventy or so, Clabe decided to prepare for his imminent death although he would live roughly thirty years longer.  But based on common life spans of the time, he decided it was time for him to put his affairs in order.  He was either friends with or related to the people who owned the house which my grandfather would later buy and live in until his own death. It is possible that those owners were Preston and Rachel Terry, who coincidentally were the paternal grandparents of five of my cousins which means that at different times all four of their grandparents lived in and owned the same house. So Clabe went to the best known local coffin maker and requested to have his coffin made in the older keyhole fashion.  By keyhole, we mean that the widest point of the coffin was roughly where the shoulders of the deceased would be located.  From that point, the sides of the coffin tapered in both directions toward the head and feet. These are a common type of coffin you still see sometimes in old western movies.  They were going out of favor by the time Clabe died but they were still in limited use at the time he chose to have his made.  So the story goes, when the coffin maker finished the job and sent word to Clabe that the coffin was complete, Clabe got someone to take him, since he never drove, and went to pay for and pick up the coffin.  I was always told that Clabe inspected the coffin in whatever building the maker had used as his wood working shop and said, "Well, it looks pretty good to me.  But I reckon I better check it out."  So he took off his shoes, climbed into the coffin, crossed his arms, closed his eyes, and after a short while said, "Yep, I reckon that's about right."  and payed the maker and had the coffin hauled to the house which my grandfather would eventually own where it was hung in the attic along with some cotton batting with which to line it.

Sometime after the coffin was placed there, the first owner of the house either died or decided to sell it and my grandfather bought it.  Since he also attended the Old Regular Baptist Church and knew Clabe well, my grandfather never asked Clabe to take the coffin elsewhere.   Eventually, Clabe did decide to move the coffin to the home of a family member but it hung in my grandfather's house quite a few years after he bought the home.  Fourteen of us first cousins grew up on Right Beaver Creek within five miles of our grandparents home and I grew up literally next door. Five more of those cousins lived within sight of our grandparents.  All of us grandchildren would frequently spend time at the house for family events or simple visits.  During all that time, I do not remember that any of our female cousins would ever go upstairs since the attic was entered via a small crawl door from the single finished room of the attic.  Most of the six male cousins, in a show of bravado, would still go upstairs despite whatever fears we were trying to hide.  

When Clabe died at the age of 102, he was buried in the Turner Cemetery which is located on the ridge right above the location of the no longer extant house in which the coffin hung.  He had also left explicit instructions about his tombstone which is pictured above.  As I recall, he told one of his sons, Crawford Mosley, to build it by constructing a wooden form in the shape seen above and to carve the elaborate epitaph into the rapidly drying concrete.  The rectangular depression seen in the tombstone above originally held a photo of Clabe Mosley which was covered with a piece of cut glass.  But, because it was not properly sealed, the photo did not last long and the glass was eventually broken by vandals and lost.  But the entire inscription reads: "B. Feb. 3 1857  D. May 1, 1959  Joined Caney F. C. (Caney Fork Church) 1884 of Reg. Baptist Was Ordained To Preach70 Year Ago And Have Preached Or Tried To Preach The Gospel".  I have known many people who have literally marveled at that inscription, the homemade tombstone, and the entire story of Clabe Mosley.  When he had Crawford Mosley inscribe the words "preached or have tried to preach the gospel", Clabe was taking what was a common position during his lifetime in the Old Regular Baptist Church that all men are imperfect and anyone can make a mistake.  I doubt that this position is quite that common today.  Clabe was also well known for being rather long winded at times in his sermons and is said to have preached for two or three hours on his last birthday.  The Old Regular Baptists frequently engaged in the practice of "singing down" a long winded preacher but I do not recall ever hearing that Clabe was "sung down".  For those of you who do not know that expression it means that when a preacher was considered to be preaching too long other preachers, deacons, or church members would begin a song in their typical lined out hymnody and sing until the preacher in question got the point and quit preaching.

In a rapid Internet search of the name "Clabe Mosley", I was able to find two significant pieces online about him.  One is an article in the Louisville Courier Journal of May 8, 1955, almost exactly 4 years prior to his death.  The article is entitled "70 Years In The Pulpit".  But since I am too stingy to pay for articles from newspaper morgues, I have to admit that I have not read it.  The other article is from the Kentucky Explorer website and can be found in its entirety at this link.  It is written by James G. Hall and contains several interesting anecdotes as well.  James G. Hall states that Clabe served for a lengthy period as moderator of the Caney Fork Church.  I have also seen his name in several of the annual Minutes which each Old Regular Baptist Association publishes once a year.  He is usually listed as having been a delegate to the Association meeting which published that particular edition of the Minutes.  Hall also states that he was amazed at the physical condition that Clabe maintained until much later than most people did in the early twentieth century. He also mentions that Clabe was well known for refusing to eat meat which had been bought at a store since it might have come from animals which were dead before they were butchered or otherwise unclean or unhealthy.  It is possible that such unique eating habits might have contributed to his long life at a time when almost no one refrained from eating anything which was available. Due to copy right restrictions, I will refrain from printing any long selections from the Kentucky Explorer website story.  But you can rest assured that it is well worth reading also.  Go to the link and scroll down until you find the title "Uncle Clabe".  I will also attempt to add some information in the near future from the Courier Journal story.  Clabe Mosley was one of the most interesting humans I can remember hearing about and remotely knowing in my childhood.  He is literally a legend among the Old Regular Baptist Church and all the residents of Beaver Creek and Knott County Kentucky. 

My Personal Aversion To Cremation!

I learned last night, June 18, 2019, of the death of a friend I have known for fifty years.  He was seventy, had never married, and was found unresponsive in his apartment on Sunday, June 16, 2019.  He was the third friend I had known since 1968 who has died in the last eight years.  All three had never married, had productive work lives, and were cremated, given quiet memorial services by their closest relatives, and slipped from the world with little to no fanfare. All three were cremated and their ashes disposed of in some manner which was acceptable either to themselves or their families.  All three had siblings who were more than capable of having paid for a more customary funeral.  Two of the three had been raised in Eastern Kentucky under some level of influence  from the conservative Old Regular Baptist Church.  The third had spent two or three years in Eastern Kentucky as a college student and still maintained numerous serious relationships with native Eastern Kentuckians.  Two of the three were native Appalachians.  The third had been influenced by the time he had spent in one of the most traditionally Appalachian counties in Kentucky.  I must admit that I do not know that any of them had or had not expressed a desire to be cremated.  But I do know that all of them had grown up in families where traditional earthen burials were the norm.  In fact, one of these three had a sibling die within this week who was buried in a traditional manner in the same cemetery which their parents and another sibling are buried. 

 I realize that cremation and some wide range of options for disposal of ashes has become very prevalent all across Appalachia.  But I was about forty years old before any of my relatives were ever cremated.  I have been deeply influenced by the mores, traditions, and spiritual beliefs of the dominant Appalachian Culture in which I have spent most of my life.  I admit that I am not particularly religious although I do claim a degree of spirituality.  My personal aversion to cremation lies quite simply in my personal belief that it is barbaric.  I can think of no more appropriate word to use to describe cremation than barbarism.  I have no belief in particular that anyone will be resurrected from the grave prepared to use the earthly body which they occupied during their lifetime.   I have personally participated in the funeral arrangements for my mother-in-law whom I dearly love and will always miss.  She had expressed a desire to be cremated and to have her ashes scattered into the Sheboygan River at Sheboygan Falls, Wisconsin, at a riverside park where she often took my wife and her siblings on the weekends.  The memorial service was conducted in a funeral home where several members of my wife's extended family have been served in their passing from the world.  At my mother-in-law's memorial service a sizeable crowd was present and the immediate family then left the funeral home with her ashes for a private family ceremony at that park.  We took the ashes in their cardboard box and the several dozen yellow roses which had been provided at the memorial service to the park.  After a minimal number of small, indistinguishable remarks, we passed the ashes in their box from hand to hand and each of us scattered a few ashes and a rose or two into the river and watched the ashes sink out of sight as the roses floated down the stream out of sight.  While a few of you readers will probably say something such as "what a lovely ceremony", I am still of the same opinion with which I grew up: "Cremation is barbaric!"

 

The Family Cemetery And Burial Practices In Appalachia

The Family Cemetery

The family cemetery in Appalachia has played an important role in social life, local history, and culture since Daniel Boone led the earliest settlers through the Cumberland Gap.  The early settlers were coming into a country in which there were no roads, no white or European presence, and no prior history by their own kind of people.  It was a rugged and dangerous environment.  In a very short time, accidents, child birth, Indian warfare, and disease began to take their toll.  Customs and sanitary norms of the time required that the dead be buried immediately.  A certain percentage of those deaths took place even before the settlers were near an area where they intended to stay long term.  In those cases, the dead were simply buried in the next available bit of ground where it was soft enough to dig. Many of those trail side graves have been lost for centuries. At times of Indian warfare, it was also not unknown for the settlers to make attempts to conceal the graves of their dead.  They generally would have done this for two reasons: 1) to conceal losses of able bodied fighters from the enemy; and, 2) due to generally unfounded fears of desecration of the graves.  But after settlers had found the piece of land they intended to call home, they buried their dead on their own land.  A small piece of land would be chosen at the time the need first arose.  The first grave would be dug and that spot would be designated the family cemetery for the Browns, or White's, or Hicks'. These first and most eventual graveyards in Appalachia were usually located on a piece of high ground, often with a good view of the surrounding area.  It was often a favorite spot of the head of the household. There was also a common belief that on resurrection morning the dead in Christ would arise with the first rays of the morning sun.  The higher elevations usually got morning sunshine earlier than low lying ground.  It was also common for graves to be placed with the face of the dead toward the sunrise.

Photo of A Family Graveyard

 My maternal grandfather, Woots Hicks, chose the site for one of the graveyards my relatives are buried in when a great-grandchild died of SIDS.  It was a high spot in his cow pasture overlooking the home and garden.  It was also a spot he often stopped to rest when he was working in the fields.  In time, a fence might be added.  Some form of marker was generally made for the graves in the early cemeteries, usually a local sandstone with rude carving.  Sometimes, the marker was a piece of wood with equally rude carving or wood burning with a hot poker.  And, with a certainty, more graves would be added to the location.  Even in the last few years, I have known of families who designated a piece of land near the house in Eastern Kentucky or Southern West Virginia as a graveyard.  I know of one near a small church in Western North Carolina.  I have seen them in Kentucky, West Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, and Tennessee.  One of my favorites in West Virginia is the Hatfield Cemetery in Logan County which contains the graves of Devil Anse Hatfield and most of the other members of the family from the days of the Hatfied-McCoy feud. 

Woots Hicks Cemetery Photo By Roger D. Hicks

Decoration was not common on graves for many years after settlement began.  The earliest form of decoration was usually some form of flowering tree or plant. Red buds and dogwoods were common.  I have found mention in two different writers work of asparagus being used to mark and decorate graves.  Both Cratis Williams and Verna Mae Slone mention the use of what they say the locals called "spar grass" to decorate graves. I have never found asparagus on a cemetery.  But I have helped a cousin plant some on one which is located on a farm he owns in Lawrence County Kentucky since I learned of the practice.  Cratis Williams was writing primarily about Lawrence County.  Slone was writing about Knott County. The best book about Appalachian burial customs is "Death And Dying In Central Appalachia" by James K. Crissman.  He covers burial practices from settlement to modern times. He does an especially good job of documenting changes in trends and practices over time.  "Coal Camp Kids: Coming Up Hard And Making It" by Barbara Ford Ritch has a large chapter on burial practices with many good photos of graves, caskets, graveyards, and corpses. It is an oral history about the coal camps near where I was born around Wayland, Kentucky. The book has excellent recording of first person oral history and a fine collection of photos on many subjects which make up for what it lacks in expository writing. 

 The current practice of placing multitudinous plastic flowers on graves came about after the end of WW II.  It began initially with handmade flowers using wire and crepe paper.  My sister and I made some once to put on the grave of an elderly alcoholic neighbor who died without family in a house fire.  But today it is common to see relatives of the deceased spend large sums of money, which they often cannot afford, to put extravagant displays on graves.  They often seem to feel that the flowers at Memorial Day proves their continued love and devotion for the dead.  I was raised to believe and still practice the belief that a far more fitting memorial for the dead is the effort to live an exemplary and admirable life of which the deceased could be proud.  I also know of a few occasions in modern times where families have turned graves into veritable shrines to the deceased.  I recently observed a case where a family spent more than fifty thousand dollars for marble and a building to cover the grave of a young person killed in a car wreck.  I have also seen one other incident in which a mother spent extravagantly to decorate and memorialize the grave of a son who committed suicide.  In both cases, the expenditure appears to be a manifestation of the inability to fully process grief upon the early death of a cherished child. 

 At some point, shortly after the original settlement, the use of grave houses became common.  A grave house is a simple wooden or stone roof placed over the grave to protect it from the elements and, in those earliest times, wild animals which might attempt to dig out the unembalmed body.  Grave houses are uncommon today.  I know of one site in Johnson County Kentucky right beside US 23 not far from the Lawrence County line where a grave house still exists. A modern variation of the grave house is the use of a large slab of granite or marble to cover the entire grave.  These are usually heavily engraved. It is also becoming more common today for grave markers to be decorated with laser generated images of the deceased.  The most memorable use of a marble grave cover I have ever seen was in a small cemetery in West Central Georgia not far from Holy Trinity, Alabama.  It was the grave of a young boy who had died in a car wreck and was very extravagantly carved prior to the days of laser images. It also fits my earlier statement about such practices often being a response to the early death of a cherished child.  One cemetery near where I grew up in Knott County Kentucky has, perhaps, its earliest grave simply outlined with hand cut sandstones about eight inches square and two or three feet long marking the entire outline of the grave.  No one I know in that community knows who the occupant of the grave is.  But that grave has been protected for the entire time it has been there and a cemetery with more than a hundred graves has sprung up around it.  That particular cemetery is more a community cemetery than a family location.  In fact, members of a dozen or more unrelated families, including a few of my own relatives, are buried in that cemetery.

Appalachian Grave House Photographer Unknown

That cemetery also, for many years had a covered but open sided shelter with a pulpit and seating for church services which usually occur on Memorial Day or, as it colloquially known, Decoration Day. At times in good weather, funerals might have been held in such a "stand" as they were known.  The Old Regular Baptist Church, The Primitive Baptist Church, and a few other regional denominations still adhere to the practice of Memorial Meetings.  This practice is an outgrowth of the circuit rider tradition which followed the early settlers. They are often accompanied by dinner on the grounds or in the home of a nearby member of a family represented in the cemetery.  In the 17th and 18th centuries, settlements were widely dispersed, communities were small at best, and ministers were few and far between.  It was common at that time for burials to take place as soon as possible with whomever was nearby in attendance.  Someone would say a few words, deliver a prayer, a song or two might be sung, and if anyone present was literate, a few Bible verses would be read.  Then at the next visit of the circuit riding preacher, a formal service would be held for anyone who had died and been buried since his last visit.  This circuit riding practice is also tied to the once monthly Saturday and Sunday meetings of the Old Regular Baptists and a few other denominations. 

The family cemetery is less common today but, as I noted earlier, new ones still periodically spring up.  At times, they come to negatively effect the price of land when it becomes necessary for a family to sell.  I also know of at least one case in Menifee County Kentucky where new land owners have made attempts to keep relatives of people buried in a family cemetery from visiting the graves.  But, in general, most new land owners have the common decency to act more mature and allow free passage to and from cemeteries.  Usually, graveyards are excepted out of deeds along with a right of way to the site.  I have also known of one recent case in Pike County Kentucky in which an old casket believed to be from the early twentieth century was found by a land owner dumped by party or parties unknown on his property.  The embalmed body of a woman was in the casket according to press reports.  Apparently, the casket had been removed from land by a landowner or mining company and dumped on the land of the man who discovered it. His land was described in press reports as a likely dumping site because of its proximity to a paved road and lack of close neighbors.  I have never seen a report that the deceased woman or the individuals who violated her original grave site and abused her corpse were ever identified or the site of her original grave ever found.  It is likely that a relatively new land owner simply decided they no longer wanted a grave on their land.  This is a rare occurrence anywhere in Appalachia although there have been numerous documented incidents in which strip mining enterprises simply bulldozed over existing and generally unused graveyards.  

Grave digging and burial practices have changed over the last half century. I was actually grown before I ever knew of anyone being paid to dig a grave and I was nearly that old before I knew of anyone paying for a burial site.  I was nearly forty before anyone in my family was ever cremated.  Up until about the 1980's in most of Appalachia it was the rule that friends and neighbors dug graves.  I remember one old man who lived not far from us who always farmed and logged and never held "a public job".  When anyone within walking distance of his house died, he would appear the next morning at the home carrying his tools and volunteer to  help dig the grave.  It was his chosen form of community service and he was dedicated to it until he was too frail to carry his tools.  I feel safe to say that he alone helped dig several hundred graves in his lifetime.  He was also a perfectionist about grave digging and felt all four walls of the grave should be smooth, level, and unblemished.  He, and most of the people I grew up around, felt that digging the grave was the last act of respect you could show the dead and they deserved to get the best. I have seen him actually use clay or mud to fill in a small hole in the side of a grave where a stone came out and left an imperfection.  When my half-brother, Curtis  Hicks, was buried several years ago in Kendallville, Indiana, I thought of that old man at my brother's grave site.  The grave, in a public commercial cemetery, had been dug with a backhoe and one side had fallen in leaving, perhaps, the worst looking grave I have ever seen.

 It was common for several men and boys to dig graves in Appalachia taking turns and working for brief spells.  The family of the dead would supply drinking water, soft drinks, and lunch.  That was all anyone expected or got for digging a grave.  At the time of the actual burial, friends and family members would fill in the grave after the casket was lowered into the ground.  I was also nearly grown before I saw funeral home staff allowed to fill in a grave.  Today, almost no one digs or fills in a grave for a friend or a family member except in rare occasions where a family cannot afford the charge for grave digging.  During my childhood, it was still common for many people to be buried in simple pine coffins without a burial vault.  Such graves were dug in a unique manner due to the fact that the cheap wooden coffins were prone to collapse quickly after burial leaving a grave with a sunken surface of several inches to as much as two feet at times.  Such graves were dug wider in the top half and more narrow at the bottom.  An earthen vault was constructed in this manner which had edges that were offset from the upper opening by about four to six inches on all four sides.  After the casket was lowered into the grave, precut rough oak lumber of exactly the width of the grave was laid over the casket on the offset to protect the casket and decrease the propensity for sinking.  It was also common for most cemeteries of any size to have a pile of unused dirt just outside the fence for use in sunken graves. 

It was not uncommon for children in Appalachia to play on cemeteries; and, in those days, vandalism was not common as it is today.  Once several of us were playing hide and seek on a local cemetery after dark and there was one grave which was sunken to a considerable depth.  As we went to hide, I happened to be looking directly at another boy who was slipping along behind tombstones looking for a hiding place.  Suddenly he dropped totally and instantaneously out of sight.  He had stepped into the sunken grave without seeing it.  The tombstone was between me and him so I had no idea what had happened. He and I both screamed and he clawed his way out of the grave and took off running toward the gate.  However, he never even opened the gate.  He jumped the fence and kept on running straight home.  None of us who were chasing him and yelling could get him to stop.  The game of hide and seek was broken up and, so far as I know, he never again went on a cemetery after dark. 

Many of the old family cemeteries in Appalachia have fallen into disrepair and are rarely mowed these days except just prior to Memorial Day.  Often family farms have been sold off or fallen into neglect after ownership has been split between dozens of heirs without division of the whole.  Also, with the construction of flood control lakes such as Dewey Lake in Kentucky, Blue Stone in West Virginia and dozens of others in Appalachia, many of the old cemetery sites were flooded.  But federal policy required that all graves due to be flooded were to be moved at government expense.  Every flood control lake built has a government funded cemetery somewhere just outside the area of flooding.  Contactors and crews would be hired to move the cemeteries and graves from a dozen or more might be put in one large public location.  Graves from the same cemetery were usually put in close proximity and names of the original cemeteries are sometimes on stone markers near their particular graves.  These cemeteries usually are operated on an ongoing basis by a board of directors and have added space for continued sales of plots.

Today, family cemeteries are growing less common and some day may well cease to exist except as unused plots with a few old graves.  But their place in the history of Appalachia has been important and every effort needs to be made to respect and protect them.  A few people and agencies from state to state have done work recently to locate the cemeteries and use to GPS technology to document them.  In a few cases, individual marked graves are also documented. 

Addendum March 28, 2017

Recently, I did a Google search of myself as I frequently do, and as I believe everyone should do, to keep track of my publications and citations of my writing and also to become aware of any potential misuse of my online presence.  I found that this blog post has been quoted and appropriately cited in a masters dissertation by Marjorie Fey Farris in pursuit of a masters degree in history at Eastern Kentucky University which was completed and published online in 2015.  The title of the dissertation is "The Persistence of Place in Appalachia: The Phenomena of Post-Death Migration, 1930-1970".  The dissertation addresses the practice of Urban Appalachians of returning deceased family members to the region for burial in Appalachian ground.  I had discussed this phenomena superficially in this post and other writings about Appalachian burial practices but had never seen it discussed at length before.  It is an interesting practice, still common today throughout Appalachia, and unlikely to cease in the immediately foreseeable future.  If you are interested in Appalachian burial customs, the dissertation is worth the time to read.  I recommend it.