Archive Item
Rutland West Street Cemetery essay
Accession Number
RFLA.SWAN.DOC.2026.04961
Item Name
Rutland West Street Cemetery essay
OCR Text
{"page_1": " ## Piece of History\n\nAs a native Vermonter, born in Rutland, I feel I have the right, indeed an obligation, to beseech the Rutland Herald and the residents of Rutland to save the most valuable piece of history in this town.\n\nI am referring to the West Street cemetery opposite the Duffy Coal Company. The reason I was drawn to this old cemetery is because I now live in Australia and work for the Environmental Protection Agency and upon visiting Rutland for the first time in 20 years, I was drawn to the artifacts which make up your heritage.\n\nI was both glad and sorry I walked through that old cemetery reading the beautiful inscriptions. Glad because I sensed the history of the town and felt the presence of its pioneers, but sorry because I saw broken tombstones, overgrown grass and even (alas!) broken beer bottles. How, I ask, can you allow such a valuable and irreplaceable piece of history to be destroyed? That cemetery should be a focal point of the town, a proud resting place for your pioneers, an outdoor museum of American history and the American pioneering spirit.\n\nYet as I walked around that sacred resting place, I felt the wind from the trees was the weeping of the children, young adults and old people who toiled this land, settled the town of Rutland, and are now forgotten by their descendants.\n\nI am shocked and amazed that the town has enough money to allow industrial development, huge shopping complexes and fast food centers. Yet you spend none of that wealth on a patch of green, a vestige of history within a town that could, if it tried, keep the place and beauty of the old Vermont.\n\nI am returning to Australia, my new home, but there will always be a place in my heart for Rutland, Vermont, my home town. So I am unable to take up the cause and I leave you with this thought: preserve and treasure your past and your future will profit.\n\nCANDICE PRATICO GARTNER\n\nGisborne, Australia\n\n--- "}
Created At
2026-08-28 11:31:11
Tag Category + Tag
churches-burying-grounds-castleton
Tag Categories
churches-burying-grounds
Tags
castleton
Tag Texts
Churches Burying Grounds: Castleton
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