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Hanks cemetery causes unrest |
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Written by DeadGirl
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Sunday, 08 August 2004 |
Plot holders voice worries after owner dies, state enters
Sunday, August 08, 2004
By MIKE MARSHALL
Times Staff Writer
Like Hank Williams Sr.? Like him so much you want to be buried near him?
Not so fast.
The Hank Williams Memorial-Oakwood Annex Cemetery in Montgomery has been placed under the control of the Receivership Section of the Alabama Insurance Department, an act that was dictated, in part, by recent deaths of the cemetery's owner and manager.
The state isn't in the business of taking over cemeteries, says Alabama Assistant Insurance Commissioner Ragan Ingram, but state law requires intervention from the insurance department when pre-need contracts - or insurance policies on funeral plots - are involved.
A Huntsville woman, Pat Bunn Grethmann, is leading a movement designed to mobilize plot owners at the cemetery. She's worried that deed holders will be penalized because of the former manager's bookkeeping.
Grethmann is a Montgomery native and a resident of Hampton Cove. Her family has owned plots in the cemetery since it opened in 1938, about 15 years before Williams' funeral in January 1953.
She and her husband will be buried there, along with most of Grethmann's ancestors.
"I need to get the deed holders together,'' Grethmann says. Otherwise, the plots will be sold again. "That's the crux of the matter.''
Grethmann has formed the Oakwood Annex Owners Group and retained two lawyers. She likens her desire to resolve the issue to "a snapping turtle that bites and won't let go until the sun goes down.''
Her initial concerns arose early this summer, when she discovered poor maintenance at the cemetery. After expressing them to Montgomery officials, she also was alarmed by the former owner's records, which the Oakwood Annex Group calls "handwritten, hard-to-decipher records.''
Those records led to worries about "who owns what and what is left to be sold,'' the group says.
The cemetery was privately owned until it was placed under state control in the spring.
Deed holders mobilized
In about a week, Grethmann's group has mobilized more than 50 deed holders. Most of them are from the Montgomery area, but two - Grethmann and Mike Lyon of Owens Cross Roads - are from North Alabama.
Another is Ruby Arnette of Montgomery. Her husband, Grady, led Williams' funeral procession.
"I'm not trying to lay blame on anybody,'' she says.
"I know the state has their hands full. I know it's quite a challenge for everyone.''
Her husband died around 1990, about five years after the Arnettes purchased the plots.
'Beer cans for eternity'
"He told me, 'You know we'll be laid up there with beer cans for eternity,' '' Ruby Arnette recalls.
"I told him, 'Somebody will pick them up.' ''
Arnette says Williams' gravesite is a popular spot for hootenannies. Beer cans, whiskey bottles and gutiar picks are left in the aftermath.
"There's always someone up there,'' she says.
But now, prospective plot buyers aren't among them. Ingram and Denize Azar, the insurance department' supervisor for receivership, say no plots will be sold until all deed holders are found.
"I believe the information is there,'' Azar says.
http://www.al.com/news/huntsvilletimes/index.ssf?/base/news/1091976390178240.xml |
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