Tuesday, rainy and cool, was a perfect day for Iola Parks Department employees to work indoors at their shop in Riverside Park, righting damage that has occurred over decades to tombstones in Iola Cemetery.
In a project that started in late summer, nearly 400 tombstones in two of the eight blocks of the cemetery just west of town have been straightened and secured to new bases at grave sites or carried to the shop for more extensive treatment.
“There are a lot more to do, several hundred,” said Todd Rowe, as he worked on a frame holding a stone marker precisely perpendicular.
Many of the markers — some dating to before the Civil War — have broken in two, some into three pieces.
All stones dealt with so far have been power-washed to make names and dates more legible.
Collectively, the stone markers give insight to Iola history of the past 150 years, telling of times when death visited families earier and more often.
One stone ready for a new base was for Eddie Stinson, who died Oct. 27, 1872. He was six years, 21 days old.
THE REPAIR and straightening work isn’t by assembly line, but Rowe, Trent Rhodes, Pat
Wilson and Tom Nevans have the
procedure well organized.
When it came time to pour the bases of two stones, Rhodes and Wilson plugged in a small concrete mixer and quickly stirred a batch. When ready, the concrete was augured into a wheelbarrow, wheeled next to the stone-holding form and shoveled in.
After striking sides of the form with heavy hammers to settle the concrete, Wilson and Rhodes leveled and smoothed the surface with trowels.
“This is a great project, one that I’m glad to see we’re getting done,” said Mayor Bill Shirley.
A short drive through the cemetery was revealing, showing many headstones that a few months ago were askew now are ramrod straight at, as the name implies, the heads of graves.
