Calif. cemetery-turned-dog park keeps tombstone from burial site

There's an interesting story this morning from CBS News about a woman from Carson City, Nevada, who tried to return a Spanish American War soldier's grave marker to the "cemetery" where he is buried:

A tombstone honoring a Spanish-American war soldier remains separated from the ground where the man's body was buried because that cemetery has been converted into a dog park.

CBS Los Angeles reports that a decades-long controversy over a recreational park continued when Cindy Southerland of Carson City Nevada traveled miles to Ventura, Calif. To return a tombstone her husband found in a canyon in the mid-1960's.

The headstone honored Edward Baker, a veteran of the Spanish-American war who died at 44 in 1913.

He was buried at St. Mary's Cemetery, but that land was turned into a recreational space about five decades ago.

Today, dogs and pedestrians play above nearly 3,000 bodies that remain buried at the grave site.

Read the rest of the story here. (Emphasis above added by me.)


Video from KCAL9

If you haven't heard the sad story of St. Mary's Cemetery, you can learn more at Restore St. Mary's Cemetery. What is truly unfortunate is that the majority of area residents prefer that the property be used as a dog park rather than it's intended purpose of a cemetery.

So... how would you feel to discover that your ancestor's final resting place was now a public potty for dogs?

Copyright © by Elizabeth O'Neal