PARK AND CEMETERY. 
195 
VARIED DUTIES of THE CEMETERY SUPERINTENDENT 
An address before the New England Cemetery Association, by 
Leonard W. Ross, Superintendent of Cemeteries, Boston, Mass. 
The Century Dictionary says that a ceme- 
tery is “a place set apart for interments ; 
a graveyard ; specifically, a burial ground 
not attached to any church ; a necropolis.” 
Without doubt a satisfactory definition to 
the average mind, but who of us engaged 
in the active and practical care and admin- 
istration of cemeteries will say that the 
real effect required of us in the discharge 
of our duties consists in any considerable 
degree in directing the actual excavation 
of the ground and the placing there of the 
remains of a deceased person, or even the 
physical preparation, care and adornment 
of the areas in question, necessary and 
important though this be? Not one of us, 
I venture to say. 
But rather will you, I think, agree with 
me that our deepest thought and greatest 
anxieties are given to the financial and 
managerial questions. While the family 
affairs, characteristics and conditions of 
mind of our lot owners require a degree 
of skill, thought, energy and diplomacy, 
which exhausts our bodies and minds, 
whitens our hair and furrows our brow. 
Someone has irreverently said that we 
have much to do with skeletons. Yes, in- 
deed we have; the skeleton of the family, 
many first brought to the light of day 
while endeavoring to determine who owns 
or who shall “boss” the cemetery lot; who 
shall or who shall not be buried therein, 
or removed therefrom, after the death of 
the original owner. 
We must also sometimes explain why it 
is that each and every lot cannot have the 
grass cut and all other necessary care 
work done on the day before the family 
happen to visit the cemetery, accompanied 
by relatives from a distance who have 
been led to suppose that their lot was al- 
ways in perfect condition, even though 
they bad neglected to give the order for its 
care, and, of course, you must not say 
this in the presence of “Auntie” (who, by 
the way, is advancing in years and has 
most of the available cash in the family). 
Why in midsummer that grass is not 
green, although we have not been favored 
with a particle of atmospheric moisture for 
many weeks ; why the grass does not show 
a luxurious growth under the trees; why 
you permitted the erection on an adjoin- 
ing lot of such a monumental monstrosity, 
and you listen to an outpouring of words 
in ecstatic praise of their own “rock face” 
creation. 
You are finally enlightened by the infor- 
mation that “out West, where I live, they 
do things better,” and through it all you 
are supposed to give your whole attention 
to the cultivation of a smile upon your 
face which can be classed as “cherubic” 
and “apologetic,” otherwise you are in- 
formed that “I shall certainly write to the 
mayor,” or to the chairman of your Board 
of Trustees, as the case may be, or it may 
be that they will decide that it is best to 
call attention to the alleged conditions of 
affairs through the medium of the news- 
papers. 
At this point your foreman gives you the 
delightful information that one of the pair 
of new horses you purchased, and in 
which you feel such pride, “will not pull 
the hat off your head,” and that the driver 
is “no good, anyhow.” Never mind; you 
must be calm ; go over to the new work, 
mount the seat, take the reins, talk to the 
horses and enjoy the sensation which 
comes of seeing them pull out the load in 
good shape, only to be met a few minutes 
later by your supervisor of interments, 
who informs you that some undertaker has 
forgotten to bring the burial permit 
(which he has probably not yet asked the 
Board of Health to issue), but promises 
to send it out in the morning. “Shall I 
let him by?” he asks. After an investiga- 
tion of the facts you wearily answer, “Yes, 
but don’t do it again.” 
The bell in the tower signals that you 
are wanted at the office. On reaching it 
you find a bereaved widower who wishes 
to purchase a two-grave lot, no more, 
“just a place to lay her, and another for 
me when I am called.” You complete the 
sale, and if he is a young man you with- 
draw from sale the adjoining lot, well 
knowing that within a year or so he will, 
while on a visit to the cemetery, express 
his regret that he did not get a larger lot. 
You suddenly discover that the adjoining 
one is still unsold. He is greatly pleased 
and buys it. Soon after he will be accom- 
panied on his perodical visits, which be- 
come less and less frequent, by another 
lady. Again the cherubic smile appears 
upon your face and you are so glad that 
the adjoining lot remained unsold for 
nearly two years. 
You are pleased with yourself and fall 
to studying out some new improvement 
and estimating its cost, your door opens 
and you are confronted by a large, red- 
necked “manufacturer of artistic me- 
morials” who bluntly asks why it is that 
he can’t do more business at your ceme- 
tery, and tells you that “So-and-So” are 
getting most of the orders for new work. 
He accuses you of giving the other fel- 
low tips and intimates that he can pay as 
large a commission for business sent his 
way as the other fellow is paying you. You 
indignantly deny the allegation and in- 
form him that his presence and language 
are obtrusive and objectionable. Out he 
goes in a “huff” and you hear him mut- 
ter through his teeth that he will “see 
about this “I will have your scalp yet.” 
A few days later your chairman of 
trustees very quietly asks you about it. 
You explain the matter fully, and he says : 
“All right, but be careful ; you must keep 
these fellows quiet, for some day someone 
will believe what these fellows say about 
you.” 
And I might go on indefinitely enumer- 
ating our many trials, but of what use? 
We all have them and know by experience 
how to meet each problem as it presents 
itself to us. I am sure, however, that you 
will agree with me that a good cemetery 
superintendent needs to know more things 
than does a man engaged in any other line 
of activity with which we are familiar, and 
that while it has its troubles and annoy- 
ances, it also has many compensations and 
rewards, furnishing, as the position does, 
so many opportunities to render a service 
and to do a kindness to our fellow beings, 
and at a time when such service is highly 
appreciated and brings to us many life- 
long friends, which, after all, is the great- 
est reward we may get in this life. 
And then think of the satisfaction de- 
rived from the effort expended as we take 
hold of a block of land in its crude state, 
hostile and rebellious, and watch it yield- 
ing day by day to our well-directed labors 
until it finally lays before us a beautiful 
area of undulating lawn, subdivided into 
lots ; and we complete the picture by add- 
ing at suitable places the choice bits of 
trees and plants, and enjoy that greatest 
of life’s pleasure, the delight of seeing 
things grow, and then the more sordid, 
material side as we figure the amount of 
money our corporation receives from its 
sale, many times the cost of purchase and 
development. 
Suppose you are called upon to take 
charge of a cemetery, or several of them, 
in which there exists, as is frequently the 
case, a considerable area of “old part,” 
and you start in to clean it up and put it 
in shape. My experience is that there is 
but one right way to go about it, and 
that is to make a clean, thorough job of 
it. If you cannot do it all the first sea- 
son, do what you can in a complete man- 
ner. Pull out all surplus granite posts ; 
that is, all but the four corner bounds, 
and store them away for some future use ; 
pull up the corner ones and with a heavy 
hammer break off about one foot of the 
bottom end and reset them flush with the 
surface of the ground, so that lawn mow- 
ers may be run over them without strik- 
ing; straighten and plumb monuments, 
tablets and grave markers. Remove sur- 
plus trees and overgrown shrubs, prune 
those left, dig or trench over the entire 
surface to the full loam depth, regrade, 
working out all possible terraces, sod 
edges and around monuments and trees, 
fertilize with any good commercial fer- 
