Ancestry Magazine

My near death experience began as whimsy.

Six feet under Fillmore County soil, my Minnesota territorial relatives were resting in peace. I dutifully paid respects to them each Memorial Day and other days in between. But I longed for a larger picture, about 826 square miles to be exact—I envisioned myself a tombstone tourist visiting every Fillmore County cemetery.

I fixed wings to fancy and began planning my tour of ninety-five graveyards. When I dropped in at the county history center to research burial site locations, the director, without knowledge of why I’d come, mentioned that he needed someone to photograph entrances and signs at all cemeteries. Angels burst into chorus. Armed with divine decree, I planted one foot firmly to the graves.

Preparations were necessary. With gas pumping sky high, I planned efficient routes. My tour guide was a typed itinerary with cemetery directions and an oversized township map. Equipped with cell phone, digital camera, laptop computer, and a cemetery toolkit, I set out. I even dressed for success in a t-shirt specifically designed for the occasion: Dead Ends Tour—It’s to Die For.

I sipped cappuccino as I approached my first cemetery. Daybreak peeked pink and promising above the skyline as the dead slumbered. Research in today’s Internet world of genealogy embodies convenience and comfort, but there’s a mystical intimacy about communing with ancestors in the midst of open space, with few living souls in sight.

Realistically, however, I was never alone. The dead were company. My hosts six feet under beckoned from all directions, begging to divulge their histories. I sensed their hospitality as I struggled to keep on correct roads—a few remote graveyards doubtless wouldn’t have been located without the benefit of some unearthly assistance. I recognized that standing among tombstones is the closest I’d come in life to being in the presence of the dead.

At dusk, I called Day One a day. I’d completed thirty-three cemeteries.

I approached the remaining sixty-two at a slower pace. Mid-way through my sojourn, I discerned my calling. Photographing each entrance as a mere cover to a book was insufficient. Past each gateway, my camera captured shot after shot of historical stone. I sought out the oldest, most indecipherable, fractured, noteworthy, or singular markers. I apprized graveyards as fragile folk art galleries. I accepted the mission as an opportunity to capture as many pioneer gravestones as possible.

Once I was back among the living, people questioned my motive. Was it simply because the cemeteries were there? No. It was because these cemeteries may not always be there. In preparation for my adventure, I had taken note of earlier reports of cemetery conditions. Particularly helpful were WPA records completed in the 1930s. Comparing those to what I found told me the toll of time.

I had encountered altered fences, removed gateways, rerouted roadways, and graves moved lock, stock, and tombstone. Two abandoned cemeteries effectively obliterated by trees and thick foliage could be entered only after I cleared brush with bare hands. One pioneer graveyard required a steep, ten-minute hillside hike into a dense forest. The markers and monuments themselves bore witness to the effects of climate and human encroachment. I returned from my journey infused with a missionary’s passion.

Across the country, cemeteries invite tombstone tourists to blaze trails, cameras in tow. The pay is poor, but the benefits are out of this world. As Joseph Story orated in his speech at the dedication of Mount Auburn Cemetery, “We stand, as it were, on the border of two worlds.”

Me? I also managed to stand at the brink of death. And in my efforts to preserve a past, I glimpsed an eternity to come.

Debra J. Richardson writes from southeastern Minnesota where she’s working toward touring all pioneer cemeteries within a six-county radius before she rests in peace. She can be reached via http://tombtimes.com.