Moving cemetery to build a house.

[Al]

So wrong. Yet it is his land. Inabsense of Law, I guess he wins. His land.

"Among other things, he doesn't want the graves around his three young children. "I feel that it's improper to have a reminder of the sadness of life so near where children are playing," he said in February.

Guite wants to move three graves that he said are registered with the town, those of War of 1812 veteran Noah Aldrich II, who died Jan. 15, 1848 at age 61; and Aldrich's two grandchildren, who died within a day of each other in 1850 during a flu epidemic."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080504/ap_on_re_us/cemetery_dispute

Readers Digest version: Dude buys farm. Wants to move cemetery to locate house.

 

[Johnny]

He should leave it alone. Teach his children to honor the dead, not dig them up. Put up a new fence and plant some flowers. Find another spot to build the house on the 130 acres.

 

[Pablo]

It is a delicate balance for the rational American.

I would buy the property for the right price and leave it - kids can handle that kind of reality no problem. It's the garbage and sex and screwing everybody at 14 gang banging khrap on TV that is way more destructive.

OTOH - he would own the property. If it's a public monument then he should be compensated for public use.....

 

[Greggy_D]

 

[Gary Allan]

Cemeteries were not something to be avoided in past eras. Now they weren't necessarily for trampling upon ..but they weren't scary places until the movie industry used them as backdrops for horror films.

Just google picnic and cemeteries.

I'm not sure how I'd incorporate a small cemetery into a landscaping plan ..but since he has a choice on where to put the house..

 

[Al]

I would guess the guy is doing this as a test case for the "Personal Freedom Horse" he has chosen to ride.

It doesn't pass the smell test to me.

What a wonderful opportunity to do some Genealogy with the Family, land, history. Could be a wonderful experience for the Children. Sadly it will probably become a lesson in stupidity.

Be nice if citizens could put their money where their mouth is and purchase the Cemetery.

Interesting if the closest Next of Kin could mount a legal challenge. I would think it could be tied up in litigation for a few thousand.

 

[Kestas]

As a kid, I always wondered what would happen to the land on earth, since cemeteries seem to grow in membership with no end in sight. Another person dies... another piece of land is taken out of circulation. Where does this end?

Why was this land allowed to fall into private ownership? And with 130 acres, why does he have to build on that spot?

 

[mikeg5]

Originally Posted By: Kestas
As a kid, I always wondered what would happen to the land on earth, since cemeteries seem to grow in membership with no end in sight. Another person dies... another piece of land is taken out of circulation. Where does this end?

Why was this land allowed to fall into private ownership? And with 130 acres, why does he have to build on that spot?


bc he is an a-hole.. it must be on top of a hill over looking everything he now owns. typical.... leave the graves alone. [censored] creep

 

[refaller]

It seems interesting to me that this site seems to be full of people who are all about personal freedoms and choices with your property, but in this instance it is the opposite. Go ahead, move me when I am dead, I will not care. Regardless, cemeteries have a history of being moved. Go to any town or city that is extremely old. It is a space saving move. Graves in the middle-east are used over and over again. I have no problem with it.

In addition, in many rural areas of the US families have family plots on their land. Not sure I would want that, but I have seen it in the hills of WV, VA, TN, PA, etc.

ref

 

[Oldmoparguy1]

This whole idea of spending hugh amounts of money to bury a dead body is very wasteful. I've already decided on cremation. Major waste of land and other resources. Told my wife to sprinkle my ashes on my flower beds... Who started this anyway?

 

[ekpolk]

It's not as if the state is coming in after the guy bought the property in good faith, and later is telling him he must do, or refrain from doing, something. He doesn't even own the property, he just has an option to buy it, contingent upon being able to move the cemetery.

Baloney.

He knows there's an old cemetery on that property. If he can't live with that, then he should find another piece of property. Those folks were laid to rest there over 150 years ago, and that's where they should stay.

 

[Oldmoparguy1]

Well, that makes a little more sense. I certainly wouldn't buy such a piece of property with any sort of convent on it, real or implied.

 

[ekpolk]

Oh yeah, my Dad lives in a rural area of New Hampshire, country road on one side, little pond on the other. Down the street, there's ancient little family plot. The oldest readable marker indicates a date of death in 1808. A bunch of families, many with kids, live in the area. And no one has a problem with the plot -- it's just a part of living in New England.

 

[ekpolk]

Originally Posted By: Oldmoparguy1
Well, that makes a little more sense. I certainly wouldn't buy such a piece of property with any sort of convent on it, real or implied.


And I was going to add that families who are concerned, and still actually own land with such a plot would be wise to add appropriate deed restrictions. This is something that must be done with great care (that means get a good local lawyer to handle...), as in most states, the courts will look with disfavor on so-called "dead hand" control of land.

 

[alreadygone]

Originally Posted By: Oldmoparguy1
This whole idea of spending hugh amounts of money to bury a dead body is very wasteful. I've already decided on cremation. Major waste of land and other resources. Told my wife to sprinkle my ashes on my flower beds... Who started this anyway?


Same here,,'cept I want to go into the lake where I've spent so much enjoyable time. Don't know what the Corps of Engineers think about that,,and don't much care.

Bob

 

[mechtech2]

If he changes his house location, maybe there are many more dead people there that he doesn't know about.

 

[MarkC]

Strange, many people don't seem to mind that archaeologists and such have spent many years opening the graves of ancient people and poking around through their remains and grave goods. But a bit queasy about moving the graves of the more recently deceased.

This does bring up another question: are property rights to be an absolute? Whoever owns property may do anything and everything he likes upon it, because it's his?

 

[mikeg5]

Mark, I think in NC he cannot just build a house on a known cemetary regardless if its his land or not. He will have to pay a good chunk of change to get them moved on top of all of the litigation he will have to do in order to get permission to move them.. digging graves of any kind is illegal with out proper paper work and yada yada.. i am just talking about NC

 

[Gary Allan]

Cremation. I paid for the composite containers and buried my mother and father's ashes in the family plot in NuWingland. The place was running out of room. Nice flat bronze markers ..room for everybody. Same for me when the time comes. Go cheap on me. The burah only chag'd $25 to do the digging and placed the marker nc.


Sometimes graves need to be disturbed. The markers may be caving in the non-vaulted remains ..etc..etc. If moving enabled restoration to a more dignified state/setting, I guess it would be all right.

 

[Shannow]

When the dam was built to water one of the power stations that I work at, they relocated an entire cemetry to higher ground.

It's an interesting place to visit...feels way more creepy than walking through a regular one.

Idiot should just pick another location for his house.