3/5/14

Well it is that time of year again; Spring Break is here and is the cause of a later blog update than typical of me. I went up to Jacksonville for two days for research for my research paper and while there I stumbled onto another Clifton Cemetery, I guess I just can’t get enough of cemeteries on my Friday field days.

           

            This week I was quite productive, I finished the majority of not only my Lake Helen & Cassadaga Cemetery Site File, but Bethel Cemetery as well. This included researching and writing a technical history, compiling the names of those buried at either location, and estimating the amount of those buried at the cemeteries to name a few examples. However, I will once again focus most of my blog on last Friday for it was incredibly fascinating even though we only visited two cemeteries.

           

            For the first cemetery of the day, we actually returned to Oakdale Cemetery, the main cemetery for DeLand by my understanding. I was actually very excited to return to Oakdale for I found to be so beautiful and full on stories waiting to be uncovered. The last time I was there, my coworker and I were basically rained out and only looked on the newer half of the 33-acre cemetery and some of the more famous headstones as well. This time before walking around the massive cemetery, we stopped at the maintenance building and talked to Stewart, whom was an enormous help. He gave us information about the history of the cemetery, told us of influential people buried there, and alerted us to unique headstones/obelisks to photograph. I felt like we were in a scene from a TV show when Stewart was telling us about the prominent members of the area buried there, for he would say the name and then my coworker would turn to be and explain why they’re famous. I’m starting to understand the history of Volusia County much better, especially when Henry DeLand is involved.

           

            While we were photographing the cemetery, there was a theme that continually caught my eye. The first was a symbol of two hands shakings that was carved on numerous headstones and it appears as though gender does not matter. I had also previously seen that symbol at other cemeteries including Clifton Cemetery, so my fascination was peaked.

This is also the oldest death date I saw there

From my perusal of the Internet, I have found three distinct explanations of the symbol. The first and most common, is that the symbol is itself symbolic of one saying their goodbyes near the time of death or saying goodbye to this life and going into the afterlife. The second theory is that the two hands are that of a married couple. The foremost hand is that of whomever passed away first and is leading the second into the afterlife. From what I’ve read, one can tell if this theory applies to the carving for one cuff will be feminine in appearance while the other looks masculine. The final theory is that it is apart of the fraternity order Independent Order of Odd Fellows, which until I started researching I had never heard of before. It would make sense since it is a symbol that is on enough to make it appear as a pattern, but few enough to look like it was unique. Additionally men and women are allowed to join the order and it appears that it came to Florida around mid 1840’s. I find all three theories to be fascinating and that they all have a strong possibility of being the truth. I find Oakdale Cemetery fascinating and I could easily continue to write about how I was trying to find a link in multiple deaths in the same year or about all the unique headstones that I saw while there.

           

            The second cemetery we went to was Lincoln Cemetery, which is located right behind Hollywood Cemetery. The close proximity is due to the fact both cemeteries once had been used for segregation during Reconstruction and over time, they just became two separate entities. I found the entire cemetery to have a very melancholy feel for no particular reason. The headstones were spread out far and wide in the cemetery and there were several homemade ones as well. My favorite had no words, but there were broken glass shards in a concrete headstone and the faint image of a woman on the photograph behind the broken shards. It’s sad that the headstone was broken, but I am amazed that is still intact. I wish I knew more about the person there, but there is no true clue about the history of whoever is laying there. 

Beware the wild cactus

It was a very sandy cemetery, with wild cactus growing which I found fascinating since I didn’t know that grew in the wild here. I know that’s a random thing to note, but I was fascinated by that on Friday.

 Overall, last week was a great time for me to finish up before Spring Break and I set myself up so when I go back next week I’ll have new projects to start on. I can’t believe the semester is halfway done, it seems like I am still just getting started with schoolwork and this internship! I’m very excited to see what the last half of the semester brings.