St Patrick's Cemetery in Jordan:
From Graves to Graves
St Patrick's Church in Jordan has its own story to tell...
...complete with Patron Saint!
When immigrants came from the "Old World" they brought their faith and customs with them. St Patrick's Church Cemetery is a good example of this.
Practicing Roman Catholic in Ireland and Great Britain was illegal until 1829.
Due to the break with Rome, Henry VIII, Catholics in the Dominion
had to practice their faith in secret
A great video:
When they came over from Ireland, the Irish brought with them a devout
Catholic Faith.
When the community had a large enough group of congregants,
a church was built to worship in.
Here on the 1859,
We can see the southwestern edge of Jordan was nothing but farm fields...
and decorative scroll work 😉
"St. Patrick's Roman Catholic church in Jordan was built in 1864-65 by Father William McCallion of Camillus; at the same time a cemetery was opened. The parish now contains about eighty-five families and has always been connected with the Camillus charge," Onondaga's Centennial, pp. 705-706.
And on the 1868 map, the church is on the map.
Here is what it looked like:
Behind the church you can see the cemetery.
For Catholics, caring for a member after death and giving them a proper burial is a matter of faith...
from cradle to the grave...
Baptism to Burial
you are part of the community that continues to eternity.
But for the here and now...
they set aside an area for church members to be buried...
A proper church and graveyard...
a custom from the old country.
On the 1875 map,
the church and cemetery are designated on the map.
(And the cemetery is not as large as it is today)
Symbols of faith are common on the headstones.
From crosses...
to saints...
the faith of the interred is evident.
But as time went on, the congregation grew...
and outgrew there old building.
Expanding onto the departed was out of the question.
They were landlock....er...grave-locked.
They needed a new site.
Early in the 1950's, they they demolished the house labeled
" W.T. Graves"
(Seriously, you could not make up a church moving from among graves to sitting on property once owned by Graves if you tried)
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Here is a pic from the 1950s of the house shortly before demolition.
The house on the left edge is used as the Rectory today.
And they built a new, modern church for the growing community.
But they did not abandon their cemetery where all started.
In fact, they expanded!
About the Catholic view of caring for the dead:
"We have a 2,000 year old tradition of caring for the dead as a matter of faith, not profit."
~~Ellen Woodbury. American Way of Death, p98
Through these gates, the right hand side is the expansion from the original cemetery
But the stairs that led up to the church building...
were left in place.
You can also se in the land the outline of where the building once stood
These stones show that ---even with care---just how fragile old markers are.
The sturdiest ones are zinc. Being made of a rust-proof metal combination, they naturally resist lichen and moss and look fabulous and pristine over 100 years later.
Old markers in our area are usually carved out of marble,
sometimes granite,
and in a few instances, sandstone.
Sandstone headstones delaminate layer by layer and shatter in our weather.
Marble breaks and cracks due to weather and exposure in the past to acid rain.
And eventually becomes brittle and breaks
This is a very old repair.
Graves have sunken in due to natural decay
from caskets collapsing underground.
There are stories about some kids who fell down into a vault in
First Ward Cemetery in Syracuse.
It's not hard to spot the land sinking in spots.
While respect for the dead was a part of it,
the very real danger of casket collapsed was the origin of
bad luck from walking over graves.
Add to that, this cemetery is on a hill...
...and gravity always wins.
These headstones are fragile.
Never lean on, sit on, push on or stand under a leaning stone.
They can topple easier than you think and with deadly results.
Just be mindful when you visit a cemetery of the old headstones!
And as you wander you might notice...
Someone who died too young...
A person's service to the community...
to their Country...
How long love lasted in life...
the loss of young children...
where a family was from...
a place someone loved to visit...
And a young man who died
died in a tragic
motorcycle accident.
"Thomas Ellsworth Boas, VETERAN
Rt. 31 Accident Claims Life of Thomas Boas, 23
A 23-year old Cato man died Sunday when his motorcycle and a car collided at the Routes 31 and 298 intersection in the Onondaga County Town of Cicero, State Police said.
Thomas Boas of Jorolemon Rd., Town of Cato, died in St. Joseph's Hospital, Syracuse, shortly after the accident at 8:45 p. m.
Mr. Boas, westbound on Route 31, apparently lost control of the cycle and traveled into the eastbound lane where he collided with a car driven by Mrs. Virginia Reick, 52, of Rome, Liverpool State Police said.
Mr. Boas, son of Mr. and Mrs. Elsworth [sic., Ellsworth] Boas, had lived in the Cato area for the past six years. He was employed as a dispatcher for a trucking firm.
Mr. Boas was a graduate of Cato-Meridian Central School and was a communicant of St. Patrick's Church, Jordan.
Surviving in addition to his parents are three sisters, [living], [living], and Cynthia Boas; his maternal grandmother, Mrs. Eva Kondra of Syracuse, and his paternal grandmother, Mrs. Goldie Clark of Champlain.
Funeral services were Wednesday at the Bush Funeral Home in Jordan and in St. Patrick's Church, with Rev. Francis J. Culkin, pastor, officiating. Burial in St. Patrick's Cemetery, Jordan.
- "The Cato Citizen," Cato, New York, Thursday, May 19, 1966, pg. 1.
Occupation: Dispatcher for trucking firm, soldier (or airman)
And sixty years later, this communicant
of St Patrick's Church
has someone who loves him and tends to his grave.
He is still missed.
He is still cared for.
He is still loved.
While we think of cemeteries as places for the dead,
in reality,
they are places for the living
to connect with loved ones-past.
And here, caring for the dead is a higher calling.
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