Volunteers help save history at Rose Hill Cemetery restoration workshops
Rose Hill Cemetery, originally known as just the City Cemetery got its name from the wild and cultivated roses that covered the grounds. Established in the early 19th century, Rose Hill Cemetery is the oldest cemetery in Monroe County.
Rose Hill is the final resting place for many people who shaped Bloomington long ago, including the first president of Indiana University, Andrew Wylie, who died in 1851.
The headstones have been showing their age for some time. Many older headstones require professional expertise to repair because they are either too difficult, fragile or large for volunteers to fix.
The Prospect Hill Neighborhood Association organizes four workshops a year where volunteers learn to clean, level and repair headstones at Rose Hill Cemetery, led by the Monroe County History Center and funded by the city of Bloomington's Housing and Neighborhood Development Department.
The most recent workshop was on Saturday, June 29.
The PHNA has been applying for the City of Bloomington’s HAND Department's Neighborhood Improvement Grant for the past seven years.
“The Saturday headstone restoration workshops are our ‘neighborhood match’ for the grant,” Jaclyn Ray, PHNA member said.
Top ways that headstones can break or disappear are lawn mowers and weed trimmers, weather including rain and wind, tree limbs and roots, neglect/poor maintenance and vandalism.
“With each year that passes they deteriorate a little more, and our concern is that some headstones may soon be beyond repair and that person’s history will be lost along with it,” Ray said. “Some are already lost, sunken, unreadable or stolen. We don’t want to lose any more.”
The cemetery is maintained by the city of Bloomington parks department.
The workshops train more residents to mend and repair the less damaged stones, since the city can’t keep up with the special care that many older stones need. Ray said they estimate through the PHNA workshops, volunteers have cleaned and done simple repairs on around 300 headstones in the last six years.
The next workshops will be Sept. 28 and Oct. 26 from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Volunteers can drop in and leave at any time during the workshop. It is recommended to wear outdoor work clothes and bring work gloves and knee pads if you want.
The workshops are free to attend and volunteers are asked to bring their own water and snacks. To volunteer, contact prospect.hill.neighborhood@gmail.com.
Rose Hill Cemetery, originally known as just the City Cemetery got its name from the wild and cultivated roses that covered the grounds. Established in the early 19th century, Rose Hill Cemetery is the oldest cemetery in Monroe County. Due to this, many older headstones require professional expertise to repair because they are either too difficult, fragile or large for volunteers to fix.
The most recent workshop was on Saturday, June 29th. The Prospect Hill Neighborhood Association organizes four workshops a year where volunteers can clean headstones and do some leveling and epoxy work. The PHNA has been applying for the City of Bloomington’s HAND Department's Neighborhood Improvement Grant for the past seven years.
“The Saturday headstone restoration workshops are our ‘neighborhood match’ for the grant,” Jaclyn Ray, PHNA member said.
Top ways that headstones can break or disappear are lawn mowers and weed whackers, weather such as rain or wind, tree limbs and roots, neglect/poor maintenance and vandalism.
“With each year that passes they deteriorate a little more, and our concern is that some headstones may soon be beyond repair and that person’s history will be lost along with it,” Ray said. “Some are already lost, sunken, unreadable or stolen. We don’t want to lose anymore.”
The goal of the workshops is to train more residents to mend and repair the less damaged stones since the city can’t keep up with the special care that many older stones need. Ray said they estimate through the PHNA workshops, volunteers have cleaned and done simple repairs on around 300 headstones in the last six years.
The next workshops will be Sept. 28 and Oct. 26 from 10 a.m. - 2 p.m. Volunteers can drop in and leave at any time during the workshop. It is recommended to wear outdoor work clothes and bring work gloves and knee pads if you want. The workshops are free to attend and volunteers are asked to bring their own water and snacks. To volunteer, contact prospect.hill.neighborhood@gmail.com.
This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Volunteers restore headstones in burial place of first IU president
