Volunteers and donors made this a breakthrough year for the Stewards rehabilitating the neighborhood green space that is Portland’s historic Western Cemetery.

By the numbers:

$175,000 collected in our capital fund drive. This leaves only $75,000 to reach our goal of $250,000. The money will go to install a water line, construct a toolshed, finish the modern fence along the Western Prom, and repair five sections of historic wrought-iron fence.

1,500 hours of volunteers’ work... and counting. This more than doubles the 600 hours volunteered in each of the past two years. It started with repairing the damage done to cemetery trees by the January and April storms and is ending with re-setting tilted heavy tablets and bases plumb with a tripod.

1,132 biographies of the deceased. Kip DeSerres and his helpers search old newspapers and other sources to reconstruct the lives and patterns of those buried in the cemetery. He has determined that tuberculosis (then called “consumption”) was the most common cause of death in the mid-1800s. Also, that fifty-five percent of the Irish burials were children under the age of five.

100s of Black Swallowwort vines & Garlic Mustard plants removed. We are succeeding at pushing these invasives back.

126 monetary donors. Most donated after Stewards’ President John Funk knocked on doors in the neighborhood. He is still at it!

89 grave markers repaired. For the first time this year, we have re-pinned marble tablets to their bases, cast new concrete bases where originals were missing, and re-mortared flattened tablets upright into their slotted bases.

73 grave markers cleaned. This ongoing work turns blackened marble encrusted with lichens into bright white headstones throughout the cemetery.

44 hours of professional gravestone conservation. Joe Ferrannini from Hoosick Falls, New York, returned for the third year in a row, with his mobile equipment and technical expertise. For instance, he raised and re-attached the cemetery’s only table monument, memorializing James Bradley. It involved a gantry, an aluminum frame, and six person-days of work.

41 new volunteers. Many came from the community groups listed below. And a regular cadre of Saturday morning volunteers is growing in skills.

27 tours given, every Sunday at 2 p.m. As we learn more of the cemetery’s landscape and history—active from 1830 to the 1870s—the tours are becoming more interesting.

7 city and neighborhood groups helped, including The Portland Parks Conservancy, Maine Irish Heritage Center, Waynflete School (4 groups), BSA Scout Troop 1, First Parish Church, the Wild Seed Project, and Portland History Docents.

5 lowbush blueberries planted. We are hoping to establish varied low-growing natives in front of the hillside tombs.

2 grants received. Maine Medical and the local Daughters of the American Revolution chapter have contributed to restoring the historic fence sections. The DAR also made a plaque for a Revolutionary War soldier and minister Elijah Kellogg, placed recently by city workers near the grave marker we repaired.

1 website created: WesternCemetery.ME. Donations can be made here.

Events? In August, the Great Hunger Memorial in the Irish Catholic section was rededicated on its 25th anniversary by Bishop emeritus Robert Deeley with dozens of attendees. Also that month, a Life Scout oversaw a dozen Scouts cleaning stones as a project toward becoming an Eagle Scout.

The year is not over, and progress continues:

• We borrowed a generator for the first time—thank you Kris Clark and Friends of the Western Prom—to jackhammer apart a large block of unwanted concrete. We have yet to use a generator to core out bent or broken pins from flattened tablets, but we now have the angle grinder and diamond-tipped coring bits to do that work, too. 
• Matt Cyr of Cumberland Ironworks may have already removed the rusted, bent wrought iron fence to his shop for repairs. Gorham Flag recently arranged to have the flagpole removed and stored until the toolshed is built. A new cost estimate for the toolshed is being prepared, which will allow the city to request contract bids. 
• Meanwhile, we are working with the city to place the water valves and pipes inside the toolshed once built. 
• Although new bases and mortar repairs require temperatures above 50 degrees and thus is ending, fundraising, research, excavation, grubbing out invasives, removing concrete patches and re-setting bases can continue into the cold weather. 
• And, by the first of the year, the Western Cemetery should be on the National Register of Historic Places for the significance of its early geometric arrangement of family plots and concentric paths. 

Our thanks to all of the volunteers and supporters for making this a breakthrough year indeed!

Article and photo by Jonathan Monro
Stewards of the Western Cemetery, Inc.