Cemetery Tuesday - Washington Center

Expect to start seeing more Cemetery Tuesday posts!  Last night I made up a spreadsheet of all the cemeteries I've explored (based on folders of pictures) and went thru my entire blog and noted when I posted about each cemetery.  There's roughly 1/3 of them I haven't posted about!  Shame on me. 

Last weekend, the hubby & I went out to dinner and we passed a little cemetery called Washington Center.   Find A Grave says there are 298 interments (307 now that I added some!)  Many are really old (1800's) but I saw a couple from as recent as 2014 / 2015.  I went back to explore last night.

Washington Center is located in Washington, MI, Macomb County in a nice area, with big elaborate houses surrounding it and a park with soccer fields just down the road a little.
The grounds were very well-maintained. 

 

 There were a lot of fallen / broken stones.  Some were set into cement like these because the bases had settled. 

 

2 different Ammons!  

Maybe it was a common name back then?

 

 

This stone was as tall as me (5'8")

 

This back corner looked to be a dumping ground.  There were lots of pieces of stones randomly laying around, nowhere near any other graves. 

The cemetery was on top of a hill so there are a couple terraced plots like this. 

This was the most elaborate. 

 

 I'm thinking this is the setting for the little stone above. 

 

I've never seen a damaged zinc stone before!   

I like how the mason split up the word "Hamilton"

  

When I was looking at the mobile Find A Grave app, it said there was a photo request for this stone, however they already had a picture of the intact stone!  The two main pieces were leaning up against another unrelated stone. 

  

Saw several Minervas buried here, too. 

 

 

I couldn't make out a single letter of the inscription, but somebody clearly knows who is here.

 

Beautiful!

There was an attempt made to glue the top part back on, but the stone is full of tiny cracks. 

Shamrocks or teddy bears?

 

I like the fancy scroll at the bottom. 

I thought the planters interspersed with the stones in this family row was interesting. 

Wish I would have gotten better pics.  They're not in the Find A Grave database. 

 

I've never seen a QR code on a stone before! 

It says "Remember, Preserve & Share..."

under the code says "mnmrk.com/23314"

The website says the page is inactive, but as I poked around on the site. you can read people's story, obituary, a map of the plot within the cemetery, pictures, all sorts of stuff!  

Social media for the deceased, I guess. 

This one touched me.  3 little girls who all died within 2 weeks of each other in 1874.

I did a quick Google search of the Dad's name and Ancestry.com says Thomas & Sarah had 12 children, but they have Elizabeth being born in 1881, Sarah Jr. 1889-1893 and Margret passing April 1, 1874.   Margret's is the only somewhat accurate info.  Thomas is apparently buried in Kansas. 

 

The top half was about 6 feet away from the base. 

I seriously doubt this is the author.  

 

Love the coloring on this one!

 

 From the gate, looking 3 o'clock.

 From the gate, looking 1 o'clock

 From the gate, looking 11 o'clock

From the gate, looking 9 o'clock. 

  With the exception of the only zinc stone, there looked to be no vandalism at all, but even with that one, it looked like someone tried to set it upright.  

Very fun to explore.