10 September 2021

Dear Friends of Spring Hill Cemetery,

There was a "red flag warning" in Sebastopol from Thursday into Friday morning, potentially cancelling our workday. Luckily, the cemetery did not get lightning strikes, so we were able to proceed as planned. The potential for fire in the area remains quite high. The small amount of rain that came from this system tamped down the dust for us, making the raking more pleasant. The cemetery (and the whole area) is still very parched, and we could very much benefit from some real rain.

Six of us gathered at the cemetery Friday morning. As we were a small group, we focused on maintaining the paths, and hauling away debris. There had not been any major wind events since our June workday, so the cemetery was in fairly good shape.

Besides our hard labor, we spent a great deal of time plotting possible plans for discovering the whereabouts of our remaining burials. Spring Hill has over 30 burials that we have not been able to locate, although they are documented as being in Spring Hill by the DAR burial lists, newspapers, funeral home records, and family records (I am attaching a word document listing the missing). Recently, cadaver sniffing dogs were successfully used to locate graves at Mark West. The Mark West burials were from the mid 1800s, as is the case at Spring Hill (https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/news/lebaron-gravestone-of-santa-rosa-pioneer-spurs-search-for-family-burial-si/ ). Jeremy is going to investigate for us to see whether this could be a good method for us to use as well. Additionally, Mike has access to archaeological standard metal detectors, which we are thinking of using to detect casket hardware and other artifacts. We are hopeful that we may be able to find some of our long lost grave locations. I'll keep you posted.

As I've been asked recently where people could go to find out more about Spring Hill, I wanted to resend the web address to our Spring Hill Cemetery website. Larry Wendt has done an amazing job creating and maintaining it for us. I encourage all of you to take a look. Besides the history of the cemetery itself, there are maps, pictures, and details of all our burials - including newspaper articles and family stories.

I am hoping to have our next workday on November 12th, and will be checking the date with Regional Parks. Please pencil the date onto your calendars.

Attachment #1
Jeremy & Sally raking paths

Attachment #2
Patsy & Mike raking

Attachment #3
Loading truck

Attachment #4
Group

Attachment #5

Word Document of Missing Burials