Pages

Sunday, August 30, 2020

Glacial knoll

 I had a letter to mail today, on such a blue and beautiful day, that I decided to take a ride through town and take some pictures for a post that's been on my mind. The drive through town was the same as last year--impassible car and foot traffic clogging the road. 

But it was a beautiful day and they all wanted out, too, and who am I to deny them the pleasure of circling town to find a parking place.

My destination was the township's original cemetery. Most of the original founders are buried there, as are their descendants; it makes me smile to see stone after stone with those old names. For me, the interest is the geography. The cemetery is built on a glacial knoll.

A knoll is an isolated hill. In this area of extensive glacial activity, a glacial knoll is not such an anomaly. It has been tested and declared not a mound. I have no idea what the 1805 settlers thought, but Mr. Stanford and many descendants are on the hill.


The first time I drove through the cemetery, which actually is around, I peered over the hood to locate the road. I still do.  I don't know that my pictures do it justice, but here we go.


The road goes up to the right, and the direction is clearly marked. You can just see the first arrow inside the gate in the first photo.


It's a lovely and well maintained township cemetery. There is a commission that overlooks both township cemeteries.


And the road goes up and up, the hill drops down and down.


We're at the top now, curving around the back and about to start down.


This is the downhill side, through my windshield. That is a wiper reflection on the window.


There are many old nineteenth century stones. Small stones, small children.






This stone is a sad, sad problem in the cemetery. Half way through the twentieth century this cemetery began to acquire the reputation as haunted and demonic. We all know what happened in the last quarter of that century, the internet came. Stories that were propagated in newspaper stories by reporters who had to produce an inch of filler became "truth" on the internet.

Suddenly the cemetery was no longer private and sacred property, it was fair game for teenagers on a lark, mediums doing whatever, cults with unorthodox religious venerations.

Headstones were fair game for destruction. The one pictured has one repair and is waiting for enough taxpayer money to accrue to repair it again. The worst I will tell you is the burning of live reptiles on stones. It is so difficult to conceive of people who feel the right to go where and do what they please. Yes, there are fences around both cemeteries. They are not electric.


Do you see what I encountered on my way out. I intended to show the rest of the circular drive, and instead I encountered two men on motor cycles, determined to ride in the opposite direction. I can see what a thrill they might find that at excessive speed.

I indicated they needed to go the other direction. They continued up the hill. I continued down, directly at them. They split, to pass on the narrow strip of grass. I made it clear that only one of them would succeed. 

They went down and roared on in the proper direction. 


37 comments:

  1. We have a farm field not far from us that has these funny knolls scattered about it. They are big piles of gravel. They are so regularly spaced and shaped that you would think they were man made. The big field where they are located is an ancient river bed. I suppose the knolls spread even further, but outside of the farm field it is heavily forested.
    No cemetery is immune to that disgusting behavior anymore. It happens here too. The old stones aren't to secure, so easy targets. The @#$% would need a piece of heavy machinery to topple my late husbands stone. I made sure of that.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I love cemeteries, especially old ones. I remember the grassy knoll from the JFK assassination. Now I'm wondering about how many types of knolls there are. And I admit that I don't understand what a township is. Is it like a city only smaller? Is it like a town except bigger? Call me confused. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. A township can be quite large, but unincorporated, and thus run by township rules. I do not know what kind of governments there are in Washington. I will look into it and find out.
      My township is very small, fewer than six hundred and another equal amount in our unincorporated village. Thanks for asking.

      Delete
    2. So, it's like a county? In Washington there are incorporated cities with their own governments and budgets, and then unincorporated county. I have a Puyallup address but don't actually live in the city limits. The area where I am is informally called Summit-Waller, but it's actually unincorporated Pierce County.

      Delete
  3. This comment refers to your last post re sales resulting from FB and Instagram.
    JL's grandson sells a special line of sunglasses designed for tradesmen. He was a qualified plumber till he came up with this moneymaking idea of sunglasses, so he knows what tradies need. He advertises only via Instagram, which leads people to his website for ordering. He has a distribution centre near Perth Airport and is currently opening one in the US. Now - the best idea of all: he gets people to send in to Instagram pics of themselves wearing the glasses whilst working. These include some very attractive young women and even his mother. Every week he chooses the best photo and awards a prize. The idea has exploded! He runs his business remotely and spends his days fishing up north. Google Safestyle Glasses to see what I'm talking about. Now - to extrapolate to your towels: why not ask all those people to whom you generously sent towels around the world to send you a photo of one hanging in their kitchen? I will do this later today as a start. Good luck!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you. I shall start a new page of happy towels.

      Delete
    2. Great idea! I shall photograph one or two of my towels hanging in my kitchen as soon as I get the new camera set up.

      Delete
    3. Hari OM
      It is indeed a fabulous concept and something you could easily adapt, Joanne. You have seen piccies of my towels in situ... but if you'd like separate files - or want me to put one up on insty - just let me know! YAM xx (who is back on duty and have had precisely 90 minutes sleep in the last 36 hrs...)

      Delete
  4. I love your response to the idiots on motorcycles. What sort of person on two wheels challenges a car? From life in Issaquah, WA I knew about glacial moraines (very difficult to dig in) but not knolls. Off to google now....

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I grew up on Moraine Ave. in Akron, which literally was the end of a moraine and the beginning of a riverless valley.

      Delete
  5. Somebody must look after the graves where all family have left the area.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thank you for the trip to the post office! And the detour into local history.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I adore cemeteries, particularly old ones. The stories they contain.
    A huge sigh at the self entitled idiots, both the vandals and the motor cyclists who test whether their time has come.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Old cemeteries are very interesting and on a nice day, very relaxing. I've posted about cemeteries a many years ago. We went to a great one in Savannah GA. once.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Some people just enjoy being rude. Sad that they would choose such a beautiful cemetery to play their motorcycle games.

    ReplyDelete
  10. I don't understand the need of some people to desecrate cemeteries either. What drives them? Why? Yours is a beautiful cemetery, with plenty of green grass areas.

    ReplyDelete
  11. I love cemeteries and I enjoyed seeing this one. It makes me sick when I hear of people damaging stones and doing other destructive things. I've never heard of a cemetery being built on a glacial knoll but it does not appear that has caused any problems.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I doubt the original settlers knew it was a glacial knoll. Maybe they did.

      Delete
  12. i love cemeteries and the histories they carry and the stories that can be formulated from the ----- and causes of death.

    Yahoos spoil it for everyone.

    XO
    WWW

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. So do I. When my sister and I used to vacation together, she sat in the car while I wandered old cemeteries.

      Delete
  13. where should we send pictures of your towels??

    ReplyDelete
  14. Cemeteries fascinate me. I like the headstone that said "at rest". Sounded so peaceful.

    betty

    ReplyDelete
  15. Now when you go round an old graveyard, it's sobering to see how short a lot of lives were.

    ReplyDelete
  16. I suppose that the word "knoll" gained currency when JFK was assassinated. As for the desecration of cemeteries, there is little more despicable in my opinion. Too bad one of those dumb motorcyclists didn't get hurled headlong into a tree. There wasn't much in the head to lose anyway.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Social media has a lot to answer for - especially the idea of doing exactly what you want regardless of other people. It's a shame to see wanton destruction like damaged headstones.

    ReplyDelete
  18. I love visiting old cemeteries and hate when I read of idiot, heartless pranksters causing damage to to any of them. I do not understand why one would do such a mean act.

    What jerks those motorcyclists were to think they could intimidate Joanne The Strong.

    ReplyDelete
  19. I have to say that the cemetery looks beautifully maintained, as you said. The commission who oversees it is doing a terrific job.

    ReplyDelete
  20. A beautiful old cemetery, too bad that vandals have wreaked some havoc there.

    ReplyDelete
  21. A shame that halfwits desecrate such a place of peace. Good on you for holding your path against those two motorcyclists.

    ReplyDelete
  22. Looks like a fine place, sorry about the vandalism.

    AFAIK Glacial Knoll is a descriptive term, and a very apt one, but I never came across it as an official term when I was both learning and teaching about the subject. If it is a single hill it is possibly a drumlin. Not that this matters to anyone but trivial me. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. A drumlin looks as if it were dumped from a spoon. A knoll looks as if it were dumped from a soup bowl. I think neither is official, or else all the kinds of glacial terminations are official, and there are about a hundred.

      Delete
  23. Some of the worst vandalism happens in cemeteries. No respect for anything!

    ReplyDelete
  24. Disrespect seems to have become acceptable today. The cemetery is so nice. I like to drive through cemeteries. It's usually peaceful.

    ReplyDelete
  25. Looks like a peaceful and beautiful place on a lovely day. Pity that people want to come and spoil it, but hopefuly there are not too many of them.

    ReplyDelete
  26. how did I miss this? I much prefer old cemeteries to new. the new ones just look like someone's estate grounds with plaques flat on the ground, not a headstone or monument to be seen.

    ReplyDelete
  27. Due to the covid-19 situation, i lost my job so i decided to engage into online trade so i can work from home. Luckily for me, i'm earning $5,000 every week by investing on bitcoin mining.I go help from a Miss Jenny, a bitcoin expert who's trading for me. You can contact her today if interested in making consistent profit from bitcoin. Her whatsapp +1 (585) 449 5861

    ReplyDelete