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By BETTY JESPERSEN
Staff Writer Sunday, July 29, 2007

enlarge Staff photo by Betty Jespersen

GOOD DEED: Scout Jarod White of Temple is working toward his Eagle Scout badge by restoring two old cemeteries in a remote, wooded area of Temple accessible only by foot or ATV. He is a member of Boy Scout Troop 546.

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"There are some stones here that are just little pieces of slate in the ground that we believe go back to the 1750s or 60s. And there is one that someone put in 30 or 40 years ago. But most of the graves are from the 1830s to the 1840s," said 15-year-old Jarod White.

Jarod, a member of Boy Scout Troop 546, spoke while he walked among the tilting, toppled and crumbling stones, giving brief histories of the people buried beneath.

To earn the Eagle Scout rank, the highest advancement rank in Scouting, a Scout must fulfill requirements in the areas of leadership, service and outdoor skills. Only about five percent of all Boy Scouts do so, according to the Boy Scouts of America.

The ambitious project to clear two old family cemeteries -- the Center Hill Cemetery and one known interchangeably as the Hughes or Deane cemetery -- has turned into a self-taught course in genealogy as well as in the care and maintenance of gravestones and burial grounds.

Jarod, the son of Kevin and Rachel White, is now learning whatever he can about the history of the two families who buried children as young as 1 to veterans of the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812 and the Civil War.

He said this out-of-the-way area near the Wilton border was once a thriving farming community filled with apple orchards and fields, all cleared by the settlers and since grown up into mature trees.

"Years ago, this area used to be all apple orchards and there were 1,000 people living around here. There are remnants of old apple trees all through these woods, and one account said that there was a Deane apple grown here that won first prize in the first Franklin County fair in 1856. It was the best tasting apple but was never seen again," Jarod said.

The rugged, one-lane road was once a county road to Wilton. It was later known as Deane Mountain Road and now has been renamed McGrath Road. It was originally 64-feet wide and was a main thoroughfare. Jarod has also found the cellar hole where the Hughes family homestead once stood and other signs of former habitation along the trail.

The centerpiece of the cemetery has several large gravestones in their own distinct plot as well as marble headstones of varying sizes and conditions. A 40-by-40-foot area has been cleared with the help of Farmington forester Peter Tracy and Jarod said he believes there are probably other stones still to be uncovered in the dense brush beyond.

"I feel that the veterans and all the people buried in these two cemeteries should have a fitting burial place to rest," Jarod said of the goal of his project.

Cleaning and restoring the headstones will take money and manpower and he has been explaining his project to area groups and seeking help and donations.

Another plan is to put together a booklet with a map, names of the families and veterans, photos of their grave sites with the transcriptions on the stones that will be available at the Temple Town Office, he said.

The pamphlet would be helpful to people who have occasionally shown up in town looking for the cemeteries and to anyone doing genealogical research.

Since one headstone was replaced as late as 30 to 40 years ago with a modern, engraved granite marker, Jarod hopes there are some family members still alive or community people who might like to help by "adopting" a stone.

Jarod learned about the cemeteries from Temple Selectman George Andrews. For several years, selectmen have been using all-terrain vehicles. to access the plots to put flags on the veterans' graves on Memorial Day.

The Scout has learned about old cemeteries and restoration of headstones from Scott Adams, whose family has been in the funeral and monument business in Franklin County for seven generations. And Tracy volunteered his skills as a certified master logger to fell the mature trees so they came down without damaging a headstone.

Jarod has spoken to the Temple Riders ATV Club, who were to join Troop 546 on Saturday for a work day. He has presented his project to the Temple selectmen, the Maine Old Cemeteries Association and the Sandy River Chapter of Maine Genealogical Society in Farmington.

And he researched military records at the Maine State Museum and online to find out about the Temple veterans whose names he found and the wars they fought in.

Emily Quint of North Anson, president of the Maine Old Cemeteries Association, said she was impressed with Jarod's effort.

"He is going over and beyond the typical Eagle Scout cemetery project," she said. "This is a very ambitious project, especially because of the lack of accessibility."

She said there are thousands of old cemeteries around the state. In the old days, people were buried in family plots on farms. Later, some were relocated in public graveyards but there were many left behind once the land was no longer farmed.

"In five years, a cemetery can disappear," she said. "There are hundreds of lost cemeteries in Maine because they were on family farms and some of the markers were just fieldstones."

The Association is asking hunters, loggers and ATV riders who come across old gravestones to note the coordinates on the Global Positioning System and pass the information along to quint@tdstelme.net.

Patricia Ireton of Varnum Pond Road owns the land around both cemeteries and lives nearby. She said she was thrilled Jarod was undertaking the project that will help the community.

"Years ago, an older man on a bike stopped by looking for the cemetery but because it is so remote, I don't know if he ever found it."

Betty Jespersen -- 778-6991

bjespersen@centralmaine.com

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