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Man wants burial site restored |
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Written by DeadGirl
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Friday, 13 August 2004 |
By JENNIFER WEIL
THE JOURNAL NEWS
(Original publication: August 12, 2004)
All Tom Perry wants is for his ancestors to rest in peace.
Right now, their remains lay somewhere on a piece of land that is overgrown with trees and thorny brush.
If one walks on the tenth of an acre site, which Clarkstown's tax map calls Quaspeck Cemetery, it's almost impossible to imagine this as the final resting place for at least 15 people.
No headstones remain.
Perry said his research of historical documents revealed that the first person buried in the cemetery, in 1829, was Harman Perry, his great-great-great-great grandfather. The most recent burial, Perry said, was Daniel P. Tremper, a shoemaker and Civil War veteran, in 1914. He was Harman Perry's grandson. Perry's neighbors also are buried in the graveyard.
"I would like people to remember them and respect them," said Perry, who teaches Earth science at Nyack High School.
For more than two years, Perry has asked the town to find out if anyone owns the tract, which is landlocked between five homes built in the 1950s off Lake and Valley roads.
In November 2002, the board unanimously authorized funding a title search on the property. Vincent Sarro, president of the Hudson Valley Abstract Co., conducted the search but was not successful. He later retired.
Perry appeared at Tuesday's Town Board workshop and asked for the title search status.
Town Attorney John Costa told Perry that Linda McCall of McCall Abstract Corp. of New City was now conducting the search.
Yesterday, McCall said it was possible that the search, which began with looking at county records of real estate transactions, would be completed by the end of the month. It could take longer, McCall said, if she runs into snags such as vague property boundaries.
According to the regulations of the New York State Cemetery Board, if McCall can't trace ownership, the town is must care for the cemetery.
If the town in fact owns the property, Perry said, he would like the town to acknowledge that and place some sort of historical marker on the site's corners. He also would like a small fence erected around the site.
"Something discreet," he said. "I envision it to be a peaceful spot, a place where we could come and sit."
No matter who owns the site, Perry worries about being able to get to it.
"We really want to have guaranteed access," he said.
One possibility would be for the town to seek an easement from one of the adjoining properties. An easement would give the town legal permission to use a slice of someone else's property to give the public access to the cemetery.
Alice Burke's Valley Road property touches part of the cemetery. She said that when she and her husband moved into the house in the 1960s, a neighbor told them there was a cemetery behind the property, but that no one was buried there.
Burke said she hoped the town would fix up the graveyard.
Besides a list of those buried at Quaspeck, Perry has gathered drawings done in 1918 by local historian George Budke that show all the headstones' inscriptions.
Harman Perry's headstone reads "In memory of Harman Perry who departed his life Oct~ 20th 1829 aged 60 years 8 months & 24 days." Budke's drawings also reveal that the graves had footstones made of sandstone.
Though the headstones are gone, Perry hopes some footstones might be uncovered if the cemetery is cleaned up.
He speculated that the headstones were carried away during the 1950s, when the Quaspeck Park Homes were built. Perry said he wished the town had preserved the graveyard.
"It's time for them to right a wrong," he said.
The graveyard is about half the size as when it was on his family's 100-acre farm, which stretched from the ridge of Hook Mountain westward to what is now Rockland Lake, Perry said.
A 1955 survey that plotted Quaspeck Park Homes showed the cemetery measuring 120 feet by 150 feet. It's now about 60 feet by 80 feet.
Even after more than 200 years, the Perrys still live in the area. Tom Perry lives in Valley Cottage, down the road from the graveyard. His father, Winston, lives in Upper Nyack.
Tom's son, Tyler Perry, agrees with his father that the cemetery should be restored.
"Some of our ancestors are buried there," the 9-year-old said.
http://www.thejournalnews.com/newsroom/081204/b0312vccemetery.html |
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