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04/25/2010 08:17:38 AM · #1 |
I had an eerie moment today while out shooting for my Landscape entry. I pulled into a very rural cemetery to try and get a better view of a nice hillside, took some photos of the hillside and some cows, and on my way back to the car started reading the headstones in the line as I walked. I realized that nearly the entire row was babies, and they were roughly all from the same time period.
I don't spend a whole lot of time in cemeteries, so is this normal? Do cemeteries usually group young children together or do the children get buried near their families? Was infant mortality that drastically higher? I could understand if it was from a larger city, but this cemetery is damn near in the middle of nowhere with only large farms surrounding it. The current population is still only about 4,700 according to Wikipedia. I'd imagine most of those are fairly recent to the area due to some large RV manufacturing facilities.
This was just a strip of about 20 headstones in the back right corner of the cemetery.
Belvill
Larry - September 17 1947 - February 28 1949 - Age 1 year
Bradley
William - 1946 - Age 1 year?
Hixson
Katherine - June 14 1951 - August 15 1951 - Age 2 months
Huddleston
Eugene - Jan 12 1923 - May 24 1934 - Age 12
Kenneth - July 30 1931 - July 30 1931 - Age 1 day
 
Nash
Charles - 1945 - 1946 - Age 1 year
Ross
Charles - 1940 - 1942 - Age 2
Wells
Dwayne - 1951 - Age 1?
Dale - 1953 - Age 1?
Williams
Phyliss - March 26 1937 - July 10 1937 - Age 3 months
Doris - September 22 1941 - December 28 1944 - Age 3 years
Constance - March 8 1944 - November 4 1945 - Age 1 year
Fred - September 3 1944 - December 7 1944 - Age 3 months
   
Wood
Steve - January 8 1949 - February 21 1949 - Age 1 month
David - June 5 1950 - June 5 1950 - Age 1 day
 
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04/25/2010 08:46:41 AM · #2 |
Infant mortality rates have indeed declined substantially.
Paper on infant mortality rates, which covers 1950 onward (thus a bit more recent than most of the headstones, but I suspect you can probably back extrapolate from the data provided). |
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04/25/2010 09:21:44 AM · #3 |
There are a few cemeteries in my area that have graves arranged like this. In one, the area was allotted to the two local orphanages that were in the area earlier in the century and the other, if you look close enough, you can see the markers denoting it was an area designated for infants from a local parish that is also no longer in existence. When I researched this a while back, I found another cemetery that had the same kind of grouping that was more recent and I was able to determine that the Church that 'owned' the area of plots where the children were buried offered this area to the parents for their children as a special area that was blessed and visited by the nuns/sisters of the church who prayed for the childrens souls. In yet another local cemetery, the area was designated specifically for children and the cemetery allowed the parents to adorn the graves with toys, stuffed animals, pictures, etc. that is not allowed in the rest of the cemetery.
In yet two other cemeteries, both had similar areas from years ago and all the graves were within a few years of each other. These were created out of 'fear' since both were created during epidemics and burying the bodies of the children who succumbed to the diseases separately was felt would help reduce the spread of disease. Both of these cemeteries have the areas surrounded by low railings with no gates - low enough to step over easily - and curiously, even today, the closest 'regular' grave to these areas is some distance away.
1916 - There is a large outbreak of polio in the United States. Though the total number of affected individuals is unknown, over 9000 cases are reported in New York City alone. Attempts at controlling the disease largely involve the use of isolation and quarantine, neither of which is successful.
1945 - World War II ends. Large epidemics of polio in the U.S. occur immediately after the war with an average of more than 20,000 cases a year from 1945 to 1949.
1952 - There are 58,000 cases of polio in the United States, the most ever. Early versions of the Salk vaccine, using killed polio virus, are successful with small samples of patients at the Watson Home for Crippled Children and the Polk State School, a Pennsylvania facility for individuals with mental retardation.
Overall, 5ΓΆ€“10% of patients with paralytic polio die due to the paralysis of muscles used for breathing. The mortality rate varies by age: 2ΓΆ€“5% of children and up to 15ΓΆ€“30% of adults die. Bulbar polio often causes death if respiratory support is not provided; with support, its mortality rate ranges from 25 to 75%, depending on the age of the patient. When positive pressure ventilators are available, the mortality can be reduced to 15%.
Two cemeteries that can be found in extremely rural southern VT are solely for children who succumbed to polio. VT had one of the first identified epidemics of the disease.
Message edited by author 2010-04-25 09:43:09. |
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04/25/2010 09:27:32 AM · #4 |
some cemeteries that I have visited do have an area set aside for children...but alot of times people do bury them in their family plots.
It could be that most of those children were related (cousins) as most rural areas with large farmland were owned by very large families and they had many family members all around in the local area...I've seen family plots out in the middle of now where and with various last names in them. Infant mortality has drastically improved in the last 60 years...many of those women (in that rural farm area) would have had to work along side their husbands to help with the farming...exposed to the chemicals and disease of the animals around them (remember we're not supposed to even scoop out kitty litter today, unheard of then) |
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04/25/2010 09:31:29 AM · #5 |
| In England most cemeteries have areas set aside for infants. |
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04/25/2010 04:38:45 PM · #6 |
Thanks guys! My initial thought was Polio also. That could have accounted for some of the slightly older infants. And it makes total sense that many of the very, very young (1 day, 1 month) could have been miscarriages or perhaps premature/sick due to hard working mothers and awful chemicals.
I might go back there one day and look around a bit more. As I was driving out I noticed several tiny headstones right next to large ones. If I were to guess, I'd say those were children also. I can see why people get so fascinated with cemeteries. I've learned quite a bit about the area, polio, and burial techniques in the last day of researching. |
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04/25/2010 05:04:00 PM · #7 |
| My mother was born in 1916. Of her 15 siblings, 7 died before the age of 9, and 2 others before the age of 30. In addition to polio, there was scarlet fever, malaria, mumps, yellow fever, and a raft of others diseases we don't worry about today. Of course with penicillin resistant bacteria on the rise and the drop in the percentage of the population being inoculated due to fears of autism or whatever they hear on Oprah, some day our children's graveyards may look like this again. |
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