GREAT VALLEY — One of Cattaraugus County’s largest cemeteries is about to become somewhat larger — by a bit more than 3 acres.
Gernatt Gravel Co., which owned the property bordering the cemetery, surveyed the site and donated the acreage to the cemetery several years ago.
Green Cemetery on Route 219, which traces its earliest burials back to the early 1800s, has started the process of turning a former soybean field into future burial plots.
Earlier this month, Dan Brown, the new president of Green Cemetery Association, was loosening the topsoil using a machine he pulled with a tractor.
Soon, C.W. Landscaping will use a harrow rake to clear the site of the rocks the equipment turned up. Later, Don Wild of Wild Acres in Great Valley will plant grass seed over the area, Brown said.
New York state had taken over the cemetery from the Green Cemetery Association a few years ago and wanted to turn it over to the Town of Great Valley, said Brown, the town supervisor.
Brown and the Great Valley Town Board instead suggested the Green Valley Cemetery Association be reconstituted. The state agreed and suggested increasing the burial fees by $100 to $700 a plot, Brown said.
After the grass is seeded, there are plans to plant some trees on the new acreage. “People are waiting to buy lots,” Brown said. While there is a lot of room remaining in the original cemetery, it seems many people prefer to purchase burial plots further from Route 219.
“It adds a lot to the cemetery here, ” Brown said, thanking Gernatt for donating the property. “It’s one of the oldest cemeteries in the county.”
The cemetery was incorporated in 1954. One of the oldest known graves belonged to a 6-year-old girl, Mary Hamilton, who died in 1811.
Green Cemetery, located in the center of the town of Great Valley, is one of eight recorded in Great Valley. The others are: Willoughby Cemetery, Ellicott Street Cemetery, Kill Buck, Chamberlain Cemetery, Kill Buck Cemetery, Old Cemetery, Kill Buck Cemetery (2) and Sugartown Cemetery.
(Contact reporter Rick Miller at rmiller@oleantimesherald.com. Follow him on Twitter, @RMillerOTH)