Gravestone Transformations

It’s raining! After losing 6 weeks to the “stay at home” order, I was just getting close to being caught back up and now the rain. So I thought I would share a little project I did a couple of weeks ago in Kettering Ohio. I was already booked solid for months out when a lady from Sarasota, Florida contacted me about cleaning a gravestone for her. I told her it would be weeks but I would fit it in if I had a free day open up.
She sent me an old grainy photo and told me it was in Calvary Cemetery in Kettering. The cemetery is huge and Find a Grave lists over 69,000 burials meaning there are many more than that. Luckily they have a grave locater on the cemetery website and it was easy to find.
The monument was over 8’ tall and the statue on it was about 5’ of that. She said that her mother had always taken care of it but my client was in her 80’s and living in Florida so it had not had the attention it once had other than a niece who tended the flowers.
As you can see from the photos, the statue was covered in Lichen and dirt. I spent close to 2 hours with a toothbrush and wooden pick to pre-clean it prior to the actual cleaning, all in all about 4.5 hours start to finish. It was well worth the time spent on it as you can see. The detail that the carver put into this was just great. After cleaning the monument was treated with D2 and it will be interesting to stop by and see the progress in a couple of months, I think it will be fantastic!
If you are a lover of interesting gravestones and are anywhere near Kettering(Dayton) Ohio, you owe it to yourself to set aside a few hours to wander through this great cemetery. This cemetery has so many beautiful gravestones that you will not be disappointed. And, while this one is not the largest or fanciest at Calvary Cemetery, it certainly is my personal favorite, and I hope you enjoy it as well.

I saw this little one the other day and I thought I would share. This is one of those I just want to clean and make even more beautiful. It’s also shifted on it’s base, probably exacerbated by water freezing under it in the winter creating an ice rink for her. I sure hope it doesn’t fall off and damage her wings!

One of the biggest questions people have is “What is the best way to clean a gravestone?” another is “How often should I clean it?”. I’m not going to get into that in this post, rather I wanted to touch on something that few people probably think about. That question is this, “Can I?”. We’re not talking about evaluating your skill level to be able to safely and properly clean a gravestone which is important, but rather, are you allowed to.
There are a few different reasons for wanting to clean gravestones. Many times it is a person who has just discovered the grave of an ancestor and wants to clean it as an act of respect. Another reason is a local genealogy group, DAR/SAR chapter, or perhaps scout troop doing public service projects. Still another is the person trying to get photo’s and information for websites such as Find-a-Grave or Billion Graves. Finally there are those of us tasked with repairing or resetting the gravestone for either the family or the cemetery.
I recently came across the rules for a cemetery here in Ohio that surprised me. I know there are cemeteries that restrict what activities you can do in them, from no photo’s in celebrity and some religious cemeteries, to the more common rules governing the display of decorations. This cemetery goes a lot further in protecting the cemetery and the gravestones within, stating “No touching, scraping, rubbing, or spraying of liquids on the memorials or monuments is permitted”. A search revealed that a number of places use these same restrictions.
I personally visit a few dozen cemeteries every year in addition to the 10-15 I actually perform work in, and the majority of those do not have rules posted in the cemetery, just as this one didn‘t. In fact, I found these rules buried in with other documents on the website for the town this cemetery is located in. I can’t say how strict a cemetery governing body might be on enforcing rules like these, but I don’t think ignoring them is the way to address them. Rules tend to be enacted as a response or sometimes as a preemption to a detrimental act. In this case, there is the possibility that damage to the gravestone could occur if proper care is not used. If you are reading this you are probably someone who wants gravestones to be taken care of.
My advice to anyone who wants to clean a gravestone, even if it is a close family member’s, is to seek contact with the entity that is responsible for the care of the cemetery and get their blessing. Another option is contracting with a professional who may already have a relationship with the cemetery. Frequently we are given permission to do things that individuals are not, largely because we have insurance to cover any damages. Whichever path you take to getting your ancestor’s gravestone cleaned, be sure you aren’t going to get yourself into trouble doing it.
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Thank You!