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Archiver > ILMAGA > 2001-11 > 1005701235


From: "Shirley Aleguas" <>
Subject: [ILMAGA] Diamond Grove Cemetery
Date: Tue, 13 Nov 2001 19:27:15 -0600


Just a note to all of you who have asked and are interested - Thanks to my wonderful friend and your fellow lister, Earl Deatherage, and to my mother (each spent a week working with me), the reading of Diamond Grove Cemetery in Jacksonville is approximately 90% complete. Am fairly certain each of them wondered more than once what they had gotten themselves into and my husband just knew I was goofy after he made his first trip out there to find me (I think his words were something like "it'll take you a year!!!!!". By now, my car can find it's own way out there.....smile. The cemetery occupies approximately 40 acres - and my mother informed me that it is almost exactly 1/2 mile from the front gate to the western most drive in the cemetery.......

I'm diligently working on typing the readings (have almost 9,000 names done so far and making more progress every day). I hope to have all of it online sometime during the next couple of weeks. If the weather holds, I intend to try and finish the reading this weekend - next week at the latest - no doubt I'm overly optimistic as usual - seems like it always takes longer than I think it will. The weather this week makes me really unhappy that I still work. At least I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Without these two super troopers, it would have been impossible to finish the reading this fall and I couldn't have accomplished nearly as much alone - easy to see why it hadn't been done before...... I think Earl's last question was "Is this the last one? Told him there was one more (Memorial Lawn) and gave him a big smile. He helped me get started on Jacksonville East too so who knows....maybe next year....

It's the help of others which gives me the needed incentive to get started on a project this size. I believe the effort is well worth it - the only published material I had seen on Diamond Grove was taken from cemetery records and included only burial dates - NONE of the really old burials were included since I'm sure the cemetery doesn't have them and there were very few records were included in the material after the early 1970s. The city purchased the cemetery in the mid 1860s I think and there were already a sizeable number of burials at that time. No doubt, like most old cemeteries, any records from the early days (if they existed at all) have long since vanished. Also discovered Sunday that some of the State Hospital burials (at least those for 1945 and 1946 - didn't check further) have name plates which include birth year, if known and death date so am looking forward to picking those up too - just really wish they were all marked.

There are many many huge beautiful markers in this cemetery. It is well maintained though some of the oldest markers are starting to fall and there is never enough money to set them all back up. The cemetery personnel are most helpful so if you find it possible to visit and need find a grave I know you'll get all of the friendly help you need.

At any rate, just wanted you all to know that I'm not retired.......just busy.



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