Rensselaer Adventures

This blog reports events and interesting tidbits from Rensselaer, Indiana and the surrounding area.

Saturday, July 25, 2009

Cemetery Plaques

The newest part of Weston Cemetery has a growing number of plaques. Near the entrance are two benches by a small tree.
The plaque between the benches says, "Christian Men's Fellowship."
At the entrance there is a small plaque near the flag pole that reads, "Another Lion's Project." I found a similar plaque near the basketball court in Columbia Park, which is shown below. I wonder how many others are scattered around Rensselaer.On the west side of the cemetery is a more traditional plaque between a bench and a small tree.
It reads, "The Jasper County Historical Society dedicates this tree In the year 2006 in the memory of our following members: William Grow, Russell Hadley Betty and George Johnson Anna Marlin and Helen Rhodes."
In the second week of July a small backhoe was digging across the road from the Historical Society plaque. building a foundation for another bench.
This one was put in by the Moose. It looks a lot like a tombstone, as if the Rensselaer Moose Family Center is buried here. On the other side it says, "Women of the Moose."The backhoe was also busy around the veteran's memorial that is in this part of the cemetery. Again, it was preparing foundations for benches. The benches had previously been there, but now they have solid footings. This project was sponsored by the American Legion. (I hope I got that right--if I messed up, tell me in the comments.) Update: I messed up. The benches were sponsored by the VFW and they clearly state this on the sides facing the central monument. The central monument was sponsored by the American Legion.
Below you can see them finished, on concrete pads. If you look at the video from Memorial Day, you can see that then they were just sitting on the grass.
There are a number of other benches without plaques. I suspect in time they will acquire plaques. It also seems another bench may be placed between the historical society tree and the Moose Bench.

1 comment:

Michael J Oakes said...

I was just out there Saturday afternoon and noticed that the benches were VFW-related.

The memorial is a nice idea. It has the feel of something that is good start and needs further development (with landscaping, signage, or something else) to become an important space.