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Plot mixup puts burial on hold |
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Written by DeadGirl
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Friday, 02 July 2004 |
The family of an 80-year-old woman expects to place her by her husband's side at Woodlawn Memory Gardens. Trouble is, that space is taken.
By MAURA HALPERN and JAMIE THOMPSON
July 2, 2004
St Petersburg-Former U.S. Rep. William C. Cramer knew exactly where he wanted to be buried, beneath a shady oak tree with his mother, father and two sisters.
When his heart gave out in October, he was lowered into his chosen spot at Woodlawn Memory Gardens.
So it came as some surprise to Cramer's wife, Sara, when a cemetery spokesman called Tuesday with an unusual request:
Can we move your husband?
An 80-year-old woman was supposed to be buried there the next day, cemetery officials explained, but Cramer was in her spot.
"I don't want him moved," Sara Cramer told them. "That's where he should be."
The mixup has anguished another St. Petersburg family, whose mother, Lois Newby Claussen, is still awaiting burial.
"For this to happen to that darling lady is horrible," said 82-year-old Mary Fitzsimmons, a neighbor.
Cemetery officials don't know what went wrong.
"This, unfortunately, was just a mistake," said Scott Stevens, regional director of Stewart Enterprises, which owns Woodlawn. "We're still working on a solution."
* * *
On Sunday, Lois Newby Claussen died in her St. Petersburg apartment.
Her family organized a memorial service for about 100 relatives and friends at a local chapel.
Afterward, they planned to bury Mrs. Claussen beside her husband at Woodlawn Memory Gardens. They put a notice in the paper, telling friends the burial would be Wednesday.
Mrs. Claussen had purchased a grassy spot at Woodlawn several decades ago. Her husband, James E. Newby, was buried there in 1968. But on Monday, Mrs. Claussen's family learned that Cramer had been buried in her spot.
The family held the service on Wednesday. But the burial would have to wait. Mrs. Claussen's body was returned to the funeral home.
"We're in the process of communicating with both families." Stevens said. "This is such a sensitive situation, we have to be careful."
* * *
Sara Cramer received a telephone call Tuesday at her penthouse condominium on St. Pete Beach. Woodlawn officials wanted to move her husband's coffin 8 feet, Cramer said. They told her they needed to move his coffin that day so another woman could be buried on Wednesday.
"I really don't appreciate you asking me to uncover his grave now and move him," she told officials.
The Cramer family purchased several plots at the cemetery some years ago, Sara Cramer said.
The graves surround a large oak tree draped in Spanish moss. William Cramer planted that tree after his mother died in 1965. Later, his father was buried there, and also two sisters.
In October, Cramer died. A powerful political force in Pinellas County for decades, Cramer led a Republican revolution in Florida politics and served in Congress from 1955 to 1971.
His wife went to the cemetery to discuss his burial. The workers seemed confused about the location of his plot, she said, but assured the family that they would take care of it. The cemetery made a mistake, she said, and it's their job to find a solution.
"I truly am sympathetic to the other family," she said. "My heart goes out to them. But I feel the cemetery should resolve it without disturbing my husband."
* * *
It's not the first time such a mixup has happened at Woodlawn.
Sandy Kearney, one of Mrs. Cramer's friends, said her parents experienced a similar situation.
Hubert and Ella Reams drove down from North Carolina several years ago and bought two plots at Woodlawn. Shortly after, officials called and said they had sold the couple someone else's plots. The couple purchased two new ones.
When Hubert Reams died in October 2002, his family went to the cemetery and discovered workers digging in the wrong spot.
"It was truly a mess, during a very emotional time," Kearney said.
When asked if Woodlawn has dealt with similar situations in the past, Stevens said: "I just can't comment on that."
* * *
Stevens said the mistake may have been caused, in part, by the oak tree. Its large roots extend partly into William Cramer's spot. Instead of chopping roots, workers may have moved his grave slightly, encroaching on Mrs. Claussen's space, Stevens said.
The plots, about 31/2 feet wide, are right beside one another. He said the cemetery would not move Cramer without the family's permission.
Sara Cramer wonders whether the cemetery could offer Mrs. Claussen and her husband new spots. Mrs. Claussen's relatives declined to comment.
It's hard enough losing a loved one, Sara Cramer said.
"This is just not right," she said.
- Staff writer Craig Basse and researchers Kitty Bennett and John Martin contributed to this report.
PAST PROBLEMS
Significant problems at Florida cemeteries:
1981: Largo city officials hired a surveyor to find the boundaries of Largo Cemetery and specific plots after workers tried to stake out a woman's grave next to her deceased husband. They found her husband buried in a grave owned by someone else. Over the next few years, city officials discover several more instances of supposedly empty plots occupied by others and problems finding gravesites.
1992: More than 300 people sued the owners of St. Petersburg's Royal Palm Cemetery, Loewen Group International, saying headstones had been moved and graves of their infants disturbed in the cemetery's Babyland section. The suit was settled in 1997, with the company denying wrongdoing.
1995: A city of Tampa investigation criticized record-keeping and procedures at the city-owned Marti Cemetery, leased by a series of private funeral operators. Records gave conflicting information on where bodies were buried and showed that hundreds of graves that were moved in the 1930s were topped with graves in the 1960s and 1970s. A road was built across many of the graves.
2000: In Daytona Beach, Cedar Hill Memory Gardens was charged with fraud and deceit after the body of a baby girl who was supposed to have been cremated was found buried in a vault with a baby and two men. Employees previously had been charged with stealing cadavers' gold fillings and investigated for illegal business practices. The owners agreed to pay $1.17-million and to never work in the funeral business again. The settlement included a requirement to build a monument in Babyland, a section where the bodies of children were lost or buried in wrong spots.
NOVEMBER 2001: State authorities sued Bethune-Cookman College, charging there were undocumented burials and multiple bodies in single graves at a school-owned cemetery. Investigators found 93 graves of "unknown" people. A judge approved a settlement in 2002 requiring the college to take better care of the cemetery.
DECEMBER 2001: Family members of people buried at two Menorah Gardens cemeteries in Palm Beach and Broward counties sued owners Service Corporation International, claiming workers oversold and misplaced plots. They say plots were dug up, resold and human remains dumped in nearby woods to make room. The company reached a $100-million settlement with about 700 families in 2003 and agreed to pay $14-million to the Florida Attorney General's Office. A separate class-action suit against Menorah Gardens, filed in 2002, is ongoing.
2003: Relatives of former state Sen. Howard Futch discover someone had been buried next to Futch in Florida Memorial Gardens in Rockledge in a plot that had been bought for Futch's wife. Futch was reburied after his wife chose new plots. The family sued the cemetery, owned by SCI.
- Compiled by Times news researcher Kitty Bennett from Times files and wires.
http://www.sptimes.com/2004/07/02/Southpinellas/Plot_mixup_puts_buria.shtml |
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Taphophilia?
taphophilia (taf′ō-fil′ē-ă)
ORIGIN:
From the Greek words taphos, meaning "tomb" or "sepulcher" and philia, meaning "attraction or affinity to something, in particular the love or obsession with something"
DEFINITION: 1. An excessive interest in graves and cemeteries. 2. A love or fondness for funerals, graves, and cemeteries. 3. In psychiatry, a morbid attraction to graves and cemeteries
Quote Repository
“Do not fear death so much, but rather the inadequate life.” Bertolt Brecht
Shirtless and Sculpted
The Men of Mortuaries 2008 Calendar is now available! All sale proceeds benefit KAMMCARES, a breast cancer foundation.
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