# The long-term fate of cemeteries? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 11, 2021, 9:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829 "2021-05-11T09:49:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2021, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/41 "2021-05-15T14:40:31Z")
Then there is also the MetLife Stadium in New Jersey, known as the Meadowlands, and believed to be the final resting place of Jimmy Hoffa. ---
**Author:** ![Tripler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripler/32/21807_2.png) [@Tripler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tripler)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2021, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/42 "2021-05-15T15:22:22Z")
This reminds me of a ‘near miss’ of a situation at Wright-Patterson AFB, where I distinctly remember driving by and seeing what [appears to be](https://www.google.com/maps/place/Wright-Patterson+AFB,+OH/@39.8402129,-84.0308719,111m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x884082d93700c51b:0x7de390afd21e6f7e!8m2!3d39.8137298!4d-84.0537448) a cemetery in the clear zone on approach to 23R. I’m trying to dig up some links to that cemetery, but only came up with [a different one.](https://www.wpafb.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/847960/dig-these-wright-patt-cemetery-facts/) Tripler Pun intended. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2021, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/43 "2021-05-15T16:09:31Z")
I fixed the spelling of the title. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2021, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/44 "2021-05-15T20:23:59Z")
@Johnny_L.A: The Lambert Saint Louis airport has been expanded several times since it got started in the 1920s. It’s actually crappy terrain for even a 1960s sized airport, much less a modern one. Geographically it’s a half-mile sorta-triangular meadow in the middle of rolling terrain +/- 100+ feet from the central meadow elevation. The area was originally rural, then tiny villages, and later became poor mostly black working class suburbia. Ferguson MO, of recent race vs police rioting fame, is not far from the airport. Trust between black citizens and mostly-white government has never been high in greater St. Louis. Often for darn good cause. During one of the more minor construction projects in the 1990s it came to light that they were digging into a previously unknown, long derelict, black cemetery dating from shortly after the Civil War. A lot of flail ensued about who was going to pay to re-inter all these long abandoned graves that nobody had any idea who was who or when or how they’d gotten there. Or where they could or should go. It was even a flail about who had the authority to decide what to do. Eventually they moved the fairly few bodies they absolutely needed to and fenced the area they didn’t move and put up some sort of commemorative plaque, then everybody on all sides declared a truce and went home grumbling. But there’s still a rise near the SE corner of the airport they had hoped to shave down by 100 feet to reduce the nearby runway’s approach minimums. Couldn’t do it, or at least couldn’t afford to do it because of the old cemetery on that rise. @Tripler: Ref your comment about a “near miss”. Back in the day when jokes demeaning some nationalities as being especially less smart than the norm were common there was one to the effect that > At {insert capital city of target group} International airport there is a cemetery off the end of the runway. Sadly yesterday one of {insert national airline name}'s jets crashed into the cemetery. The death toll is up to 5,000 passengers and the authorities say they’re _still_ recovering bodies. Ba dum Tish!! I’ll be here all week. Try the veal and don’t forget to tip your servers! ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2021, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/45 "2021-05-16T02:39:36Z")
> [@Tripler](#): > > This reminds me of a ‘near miss’ of a situation at Wright-Patterson AFB, where I distinctly remember driving by and seeing what [appears to be](https://www.google.com/maps/place/Wright-Patterson+AFB,+OH/@39.8402129,-84.0308719,111m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x884082d93700c51b:0x7de390afd21e6f7e!8m2!3d39.8137298!4d-84.0537448) a cemetery in the clear zone on approach to 23R. I’m trying to dig up some links to that cemetery, but only came up with [a different one.](https://www.wpafb.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/847960/dig-these-wright-patt-cemetery-facts/) And of course there is [a classic ethnic joke](http://www.ahajokes.com/avi005.html)… (Edit…should have read the next post…) ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2021, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/46 "2021-05-16T20:29:19Z")
In Pakistan it’s 70 years since the last burial, after which tye bodies can be moved and the land reused,. Not since regular burials stopped, the last burial, **any** new burials restarts the clock. On my way to work there is a tiny cemetery, which causes the highway to take a detour, where there was additional burial in the 60’s. Pretty sure whenever in the 2030’s it hits 70 years and 1 day the bulldozers will be there. They try to dispose of the bodies with dignity, though I sometimes think they sell many bones to the glue factory. 😏 The 70 year rule is since I suspect that’s about that long before anyone who gives a shit will dead and anyone who has the ability to protest will have money to pay for the upkeep. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2021, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/47 "2021-05-16T22:14:54Z")
Sounds very sensible. Clearly if cemetery land was never reused, eventually every square inch of dry land would become a cemetery. Long before that those folks still living would all have starved for lack of space to grow food. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2021, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/48 "2021-05-17T15:10:49Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > The 70 year rule is since I suspect that’s about that long before anyone who gives a shit will dead and anyone who has the ability to protest will have money to pay for the upkeep. That seems sensible, maybe even conservative. I’ve often felt that graves shouldn’t be protected forever, but only until the last living person who gives a shit dies. Which I suppose means that William Shakespeare’s grave should be protected longer than mine. That seems okay to me. (I will encourage my relatives to cremate me and plant a tree over my ashes. I’d just as soon my rotted remains don’t take up space forever.) ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2021, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/49 "2021-05-17T16:14:43Z")
Since cemeteries are so space inefficient and cremation produces a lot of undesirable greenhouse gasses for what’s ultimately a fairly frivolous reason I suppose we could take a page from Dr. Evil’s book: > Feed them to the sharks with frikkin’ laser beams on their heads. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2021, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/50 "2021-05-17T20:07:03Z")
My mother has always said that funerary rites and graves are for the comfort of the _living_ not the dead. Once the erstwhile living loved ones have joined the deceased in the afterlife, really what use is there anymore to waste a perfectly good plot of land? Always thought the Parsis have the best idea, put em up in a tower and feed them to the birds. Even if it was rather distressing to witness as a teenager. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2021, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/51 "2021-05-17T21:44:05Z")
We’ll always be a sentimental species, but once we get past the ancient religious idea that the now-dead body is of any value to the departed defunct personality we’ll become a lot more practical about disposing of what really is a nuisance byproduct of our lives. ---
**Author:** ![Raza](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/raza/32/213_2.png) [@Raza](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raza)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2021, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/52 "2021-05-17T21:46:14Z")
Mathis Airport, in the Cumming/Suwanee area of Georgia, had graves underneath the runway with the headstones flush with the asphalt: > **[Graves on Airport Runways](https://www.amusingplanet.com/2016/05/graves-on-airport-runways.html)** The airport has since been closed and removed, and there is now a small housing development. Drama involved, of course, with lots of “well, uh” statements by the selling landowner: > **[Property seller digs up tombstones from family cemetery](https://www.wsbtv.com/news/local/property-seller-digs-tombstones-family-cemetery/242049851/)** > > From the cockpit of a small plane above Mathis Airport in Cumming, it's easy to miss the 10 slabs of marble embedded in the runway. ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2021, 10:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/53 "2021-05-18T10:36:26Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > I fixed the spelling of the title. Thanks. I spelled it right inside my OP, but somehow my brain suffered a brownout when I was writing the title. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2021, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/54 "2021-05-18T16:45:45Z")
> [@Machine\_Elf](#): > > … brain suffered a brownout … Is that like “can’t spell for shit”? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Yllaria](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yllaria/32/3452_2.png) [@Yllaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yllaria)\ **Post date:** [May 20, 2021, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/55 "2021-05-20T03:14:21Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > San Francisco moved most of the cemeteries out, moved some of the stones and most of the bodies. As was mentioned in a nitpicking webcomic review of X-Files Season 3, Episode 19: [Hell Money](http://www.shaenon.com/monsteroftheweek/2013/11/08/11082013/) ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2021, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/56 "2021-05-29T03:17:29Z")
Today I was skimming around in a local history book written in 123, and of the many items that caught my curiosity for further research, I found this: > On one of the roads between Anderson and Belton there glams a tombstone beside the road. > > Seventy odd years ago there was a doctor who lived near where the town of Piedmont has grown up. He had one little daughter, and several sons. The little girl loved people, she liked to see them moving about, and she constantly played beside the public road, until her little figure became familiar to the people who often passed that way, and they called her “the girl who plays by the side of the road.” In 1859 the child died, and they buried her where she had loved to play, beside the public road. And there today, protected by a little fence and marked by a stone, sleeps the girl who played by the side of the road. A few days after her death her family, the Howells, went to Texas. Curious to see if the grave was still around, some googling proved that it is: > **[Little Leila died in Grove Station in March 201859 burried beside Piedmont...](https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-greenville-news-little-leila-died-in/29359834/)** > > Clipping found in The Greenville News published in Greenville, South Carolina on 6/26/1962. Little Leila died in Grove Station in March 201859 burried beside Piedmont highway. > **[The Forgotten South Carolina Gravesite That No One Ever Visits](https://www.onlyinyourstate.com/south-carolina/little-leila-howell-grave-piedmont-sc/)** > > The world has grown up around this tiny little grave. Maintained for 162 years now. ---
**Author:** ![Bill\_Door](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@Bill\_Door](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_Door)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2021, 11:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/57 "2021-05-29T11:40:19Z")
> [@DPRK](#): > > If you wait for a while, it’s all bones and I assume it is technically possible to get rid of those too, if desired. A cup of bone meal will really make those roses bloom. ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2021, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/58 "2021-05-30T23:43:58Z")
> [@Bill\_Door](#): > > A cup of bone meal will really make those roses bloom. Some readers may not be aware that for decades there was an industry sourcing bone meal from the area around a small town in Belgium named Waterloo. ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 8:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/59 "2021-06-01T08:58:18Z")
I read that and immediately thought it was probably apocryphal. I looked it up and found this: > Farmers may have lost their crops in 1815, but they were at least rewarded with bumper harvests in subsequent years. The bone meal and blood fertilised the fields wonderfully. > The advantages of bone meal were well-known and entrepreneurs ‘harvested’ the fields of Waterloo for the bones of the dead, which were ground up and sold as fertiliser. This was the view of _The New Annual Register_ in 1822: [More unpleasantness after Waterloo. | Writing About Writing (tomwilliamsauthor.co.uk)](https://tomwilliamsauthor.co.uk/more-unpleasantness-after-waterloo/) ---
**Author:** ![Banksiaman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banksiaman/32/3334_2.png) [@Banksiaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banksiaman)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2021, 12:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829/60 "2021-06-01T12:36:30Z")
I’m sure it and other battlefields provided teeth for dentures as well. The term 'Waterloo teeth" came in later for what was a [long-established practice](https://bda.org/museum/collections/teeth-and-dentures/waterloo-teeth). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-long-term-fate-of-cemeteries/941829.md?page=4)