Date of Visit: June 13, 2024
Address:17102 Stanaford Road, Danese, WV 25831
One of the things that I love about traveling is finding small cemeteries along country roads and wandering through them to check out the history of a place. Unfortunately, many small country cemetaries leave me with more questions than answers and this one was no exception. It was small and very well kept and even some of the older graves had flowers on them, but I wanted to know more about the people who populated this place and who mourned the loved ones who had left too soon.
As my daughter and I visited (see her account here) not too long after Memorial Day, it wasn’t surprising to see many graves adorned with American flags as recognition of our veterans’ service to our country. A number of graves were also adorned with fresh and silk flowers, and it warmed my heart to see graves from 50 years ago that were clean and well-kept with flowers showing someone still cared.
The graves of children are also hard to visit as I imagine the horrific pain that the parents must have gone through. I cannot imagine the pain of having a child die and having to plan their funeral instead of their future. One family had lost two infants, Kathy and John, almost three years to the day apart. John was born on February 24, 1954 and died on February 25, 1954 and Kathy was born on February 24, 1957 and died on February 26, 1957. The pain their parents went through must have been incredible. And despite both infants having lived one day almost 70 years ago, both graves were well tended and had small bouquets. My mind immediately began to wonder who was placing flowers on their graves in such an act of devotion.
The other graves that tugged at my heart strings were several with hand carved gravestones. I cannot imagine the act of devotion required to carve a tombstone for a loved one. The saddest of these was one from 1935 for Andy. Based on the tombstone, it looked as if Andy was 9 when he tied and he was buried next to a relative who also died in 1935. My mind spun all kinds of questions around their deaths wondering if they were father and son, wondering who carved Andy’s tombstone, and wondering who they left behind.
A small fenced off corner of Smailes Cemetery was labeled Sovine-Zickafoose Cemetery. As with the larger cemetery, the graves here were well kept and there were flowers on a number of graves. There was no indication as to whether the Sovine-Zickafoose family was related to Smailes or if they just happened to choose to put cemeteries in adjacent plots of land.
Although I left with more questions than answers, it made me smile to know that in this corner of West Virginia, the dead were not forgotten and their families visited with them on a regular basis. I guess that’s really all any of us can ask for.