Cemetery In Grave Condition

Thursday, May 10th 2007, 7:39 pm

By: News On 6

A Delaware County woman is asking for help to fix up a century old cemetery that has fallen into disrepair. You can tell the little graveyard, with two people buried there, was once a peaceful place. News On 6 anchor Craig Day reports now itâ€™s an overgrown eyesore.

The rolling hills of Cherokee County are a beautiful sight. It's no wonder William Hendricks wanted to be buried here, but at the little cemetery between Fort Gibson and Tahlequah, that beauty has been overtaken by thorns, weeds and the elements and time.

"He doesn't deserve this,â€ said property owner Nancy Wells. â€œHe and his wife deserve to be buried and people respect their gravesite."

Wells owns the property where the two graves are located. William H. Hendricks Junior was born in 1831 and died in 1911. His wife Anna Eliza Hendricks is also buried there.

Wells says it's too much for her to clean up the small cemetery alone. She hopes it can become a historic site or at least maintained by a historical society or civic group.

From the small amount of research that Wells has been able to do, she found that Hendricks was an early day pioneer in Indian Territory, serving as a postmaster in a community right across the road. He was an early day political leader and came to Indian Territory on the Trail of Tears.

"He came to Oklahoma on the Trail of Tears with his mother and eight of his siblings," Wells said. "It's gone long enough. Something might come in and knock it down again and this time we might not be fortunate enough for the tops of the tombstones to be saved."

Those headstones will need to be uprighted. An old ornamental iron fence, damaged by cattle, will also have to be fixed. Wells say it will be a lot of work to clean things up, but she thinks that's the way Hendricks and his wife would have wanted it.

"To fix it up and let these people have a pretty place to rest in peace,â€ Wells said.

Wells says the Cherokee Nation is interested in helping clean up and maintain the cemetery. She says it would be great if the cemetery could be cleaned up by Memorial Day.

Watch the video: Land Owner Wants Help Preserving Century Old Graveyard