Unveiling brings Calhoun cemetery back to life
Patrick Day and Troy Hoover of Boy Scout Troop 243, kick off the unveiling of Ranger Cemetery as a Historic Texas Cemetery with the presentation of the colors and pledges.
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Burial Timeline
1840 - H. Oram Watts
1846 - W. Gibson Ewing
1850 - Margaret Eveline Lytle
1867 - T.S. Burke Jr.
1868 - Laura West Thornton
1879 - James Gardiner
1882 - Ezmilla Clara Booth Garner
...- SHOW ALL »
Burial Timeline
1840 - H. Oram Watts
1846 - W. Gibson Ewing
1850 - Margaret Eveline Lytle
1867 - T.S. Burke Jr.
1868 - Laura West Thornton
1879 - James Gardiner
1882 - Ezmilla Clara Booth Garner
1884 - Addie H. Cloud Rubert
1888 - John. B Burke
1890 - Robert E. Booth
1892 - Mary A. Cavitt Booth
1892 - Peter Rasmussen's infant sons
1894 - Jewett E. Thayer
1897 - Eliza Ann Burke
1905 - Emma A. Garner Sterne
1907 - Arcadia Katie Garner McGaffey
1907 - Kate C. Booth Johnson
1908 - Harris Martin Brown
1914 - Jacob H. Garner
1914 - Sarah Emma Booth Gargner
1921 - Charles Rubert
1941 - Joseph E. Thayer
If the Ranger Cemetery in Port Lavaca could speak, it would impart stories of what it has seen in its 169-year-old existence.
These stories of early settlers, natural disasters, disease and the city's history were all reasons the cemetery was designated as a Historic Texas Cemetery on Saturday morning.
Living descendants of families buried in the cemetery unveiled the medallion just outside the cemetery's hurricane gate following speeches from the members of the Calhoun County History Commission and state Rep. Todd Hunter.
"By doing this dedication today, not only are you doing this by a county standpoint, but you are doing this by a state standpoint," he said.
Marking this cemetery as historic is a great educational tool for people now and those down the line, he said.
Trampling over tangled weeds and shuffling through tall grass is how one descendant, Nell Harwood, remembers visiting her grandparent's gravesite in the mid 1900s.
"The tombstones were leaning and there was mildew and mold on them," the 88-year-old said. "It's just a beautiful place now to see."
Her grandparents, Joseph and Jewett Thayer, lived on a hill near the cemetery and harbor, she said.
"My grandfather wanted to bury grandma as close to the waters edge so he could sit in his rocking chair and see her grave," she recalled.
Since then, the cemetery has been cleaned up drastically and is now better preserved, she said.
The induction as a Texas Historic Cemetery also protects the cemetery from being disregarded or demolished for city expansion.
"It's wonderful," she said. "This way, you know that it will always be there."
The cemetery's oldest grave belongs to H. Oram Watts, whose tombstone is in the center of the grounds. Watts was killed in the Comanche raid on Linnville on Aug. 8, 1840.
Many of those buried in the cemetery are family of Jacob Garner, William James, Charles Rubert and Ike Johnson, four men who owned a share of the cemetery with F. B. Buster, the original property owner.
Transforming the frail cemetery to make it into a Texas Historic Cemetery was no easy task said Mary Belle Meitzen, cemetery chair.
"The ceremony itself is like the top of the icing," she said. "The most important thing is that the cemetery is recorded on deed. It cannot be bulldozed down. It would have to be moved if industrial expansion took over this area."
In 1977, the cemetery was marked as a historical site. Being marked as a Historic Texas Cemetery is similar, but is a more extensive process, said Mary Belle Meitzen, cemetery chair.
The process involved more than 700 hours of gathering documentation such as maps, photographs and history and washing and reconstructing tombstones. Mowing lawns and excavation were also done to get the cemetery designation, she said.
"Each member that works with me and every city and county employee are exposed to history of people who walked before us," she said. "It makes us in awe of what they experienced to create a city or a town and to leave something for another generation."
