A Lonely Ceremony on Saturday

By Douglas Graves
© 2009

A lonely ceremony on Saturday, May 30 marked the service and sacrifice of the men and women who lay in the South Bethlehem hillside cemetery. Many lay in unmarked graves, the ground sunken in on them when their wooden coffins gave way. Some lay with toppled granite obelisks beside their resting place, the bases, the shafts, and the crowns all asunder.
“The ones with level bases were knocked over by vandals,” said one of the men who supervise the county-provided work release grass cutters that do their community service time here. “The ones with un-level bases were knocked down by Mother Nature.”
“Some people just treat the cemetery as a vacant lot,” he said.
The memorial organizers have been meeting here on May 30 for the past couple of years because that is the traditional date of the old “Decoration Day” that was supplanted by “Memorial Day.”
Decoration Day was when families took the children to the cemetery to remember their ancestors and decorate their graves and tombs. Usually, they would tidy up the grave site. It is a tradition largely given over to trips to the beach or mountains to make the most of a long weekend--or for shopping for “Memorial Day Specials.”
A cooling breeze came up the slope from South 4th Street bringing relief from the bright mid-morning sun. A group of about 20 gathered in the shade to commemorate the dead. The officials, veterans and clergy out numbered those without an official duty to perform.
The pastor of the church, Monsignor Robert Biszek, came to offer a prayer. “We remember with a sense of gratitude and humility the thousands and thousands of people and the torch of freedom they so gallantly carried,” prayed the pastor.
Representative Joe Brennan was there with his son. Mayor John Callahan offered a brief history of Memorial Day, saying that its beginning was in the simple task of mothers and wives of dead Confederate soldiers who, while cleaning up and caring their men folk, decided to extend the kindness to the dead Federal soldiers.
Three Cub Scouts were there with their Den Mother, Paula Gabriel and Assistant Den Mother, Sonia Moser. They represented Pack 397 sponsored by the Holy Infancy School. Gianni Gonzales, 8, Angel Negron, 9, and Luis St-Amand weren’t the only ones in uniform.
About 75 feet up the hill American Legion squad of veterans, armed with 30-06 M-1 rifles, prepared to render honors with a salute. American Legion Post 379 members Eric Shimer, Steve Melnick, Ralph Romano, and John M. McCulloch shouldered their weapons and fired in quick, sharp volleys.
A baby, startled from deep sleep in her stroller, began a fitful cry. She seemed to calm as the bugler, Marine Ralph Brodt III, began to sound “Taps.”
The Holy Infancy Church has responsibility for the cemetery that is owned by the Allentown Diocese. All of the mowing and minimal maintenance is done by volunteers and people sentenced to community service.
Many of the grave stones in the St. Michael’s Cemetery bear the names of Civil War era soldiers who ensured that their country would endure.
There are no new graves in St. Michael’s said the monsignor. He pointed to the crest of the hill toward some trees. There are more graves overgrown in the woods, he said.
The proud Bethlehem Iron men and their families who are buried here surely never imagined that their grave markers—some magnificent and expensive, others humble—would some day be tumbled about. They must have thought that being buried in the church’s cemetery would assure them of perpetual care and respect.
The vandals have been no respecters of nationality. Stone memorials with Italian names lay cast down in the same grass as do those with Irish names.
The cemetery faces a row of squeezed-together houses that once would have been tidy and well cared for—filled with citizens who built the community and the church and entrusted their loved ones to its perpetual care. They couldn’t have known that their faith was so misplaced.
The wind-swept hillside with its graves and head stones is still a solemn and once beautiful place but it contrasts sadly with the carefully maintained and honored graveyards in the care of the American government who make an honest effort to keep faith with fallen veterans around the world.
According to the pastor, there is very little money for maintenance and repair of the sacred site. Any one that wants to donate money or labor for the care and restoration of the formerly magnificent resting place can call the church at 610-866-1121.