Traveling Through Time With the Shelby County Historical Society
Feature on Carey Cemetery. TOPIC: PEOPLE & PIONEERS
Written by Lewis Diehl in July, 1999

VOLUNTEERS RESTORE LONG-NEGLECTED HARDIN-AREA (CAREY) CEMETERY...Pg 2
Groundhog Damage
Groundhogs had undermined memorials, their tunnels later caving in, with the stones falling over and sinking with them. New burrows were dug, the dirt brought up covering over the sinking stones. The process was repeated over and over in some places, so that headstones were found as much as three deep and two feet down. The burrows went down so far that casket handles and hinges had been brought to the surface, as well as a few pieces of human bone. It seemed paradoxical that the toppled and buried stones were the best preserved.

With the headstones and footstones came larger monuments. In this school of practical education, Greg and Mark began their lessons in physics. Having no heavy equipment, which would have been destructive anyhow, simple machines — inclined plane, lever, wheel, and pulley — were put to effective use as we applied spud bar and comealong. After the Stephens monument base had been put back together and leveled, its obelisk was winched up a heavy plank on rollers made from pieces of sapling. The plank was then used as a lever to help get it upright.

Measuring the toppled Burress memorial and figuring in the specific gravity of marble showed it to be about 917 pounds. Its bottom end was raised up to the high base with chain, rope, and comealong, the base protected with wood and used as a fulcrum. A pulley was fastened to a stout tree branch overhead to lift it upright. Poles were used to steady and guide it from a safe distance; a slip could have been disastrous. We spent almost 3 hours getting the deeply buried McClintock obelisk up out of the ground and upright on its base, using a jack, levers, ropes, and the comealong.

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The George Savage marker in the background, center, was one of the few standing before restoration work at Carey Cemetery began just 20 years ago by the Diehl family and others.

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The McClintock monument, at right, was unearthed after being buried under the tombstone behind it, with yet another stone over that. Workers reset the base for the McClintock stone.

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