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Vandals
Topple Headstones In Historic Cemetery
By Peter Hecht
Bee Staff Writer
(Published January 25, 1999)
John
Bettencourt, tour coordinator for Sacramento's Old City
Cemetery, moved among the graves of early California
pioneers Sunday with the grim precision of a crime scene
investigator.
Earlier
Sunday, Sacramento County Sheriff's Department work
crews who routinely repair brickwork, trim bushes and
clear litter from the renowned cemetery found more than
50 gravestones kicked over, cracked or broken by
vandals.
After
police responded, Bettencourt -- a retired grocer who
devotes his time to preserving and honoring the pioneer
cemetery -- came with a clipboard to log the desecration
of history.
He
stooped before a toppled marble monument -- so heavy
that its crown was driven into the ground when it fell.
He tried to make out a nearly illegible name of an early
pioneer, William Wilson, who died in 1877. Then he
picked up some glistening pieces of marble that had
broken off when the tombstone went down.
"It's
just a shame," Bettencourt said, his voice tailing
off. "If people would just stop and think for a
moment . . . "
Sacramento
Police Lt. Cecil Calender said the damage was estimated
at $25,000 to $50,000. He said police investigators went
to the cemetery Sunday morning and a second team was
dispatched to look for clues in the late afternoon.
"Usually,
this is not an ordinary crime where you get informants
and fingerprints and that kind of thing. But sometimes
we get lucky," Calender said.
The
vandalism discovered Sunday came a little more than
three years after vandals, in successive attacks,
toppled more than 100 tombstones at the cemetery. No
arrests were made.
Established
in 1849, Old City Cemetery contains grave sites of
Sacramento founder John A. Sutter Jr., early California
governors Newton Booth and John Bigler, former railroad
baron Mark Hopkins and philanthropists Edwin Bryant
Crocker and Margaret Rhodes Crocker.
But
not much was known Sunday of the people, likely
residents or early descendants of the Gold Rush era,
whose gravestones were violated. One kicked over and
cracked headstone bore only these legible words:
"My Wife." Nearby, in what appeared to be a
child's marker, a toppled stone was engraved with a lamb
and the words, "Darling Johnny."
The
damage was found early Sunday morning as about 70
members of Sacramento County Sheriff's Department work
crews -- contingents of low-level criminal offenders
working off their sentences -- began alerting
supervisors at several locations in the cemetery.
"The
first crew leader came to me and said, 'We've got stones
down.' Then the second crew leader came in, and then
another," said Curtis Clark, a city parks
maintenance employee coordinating the work crews.
"Man, it just sort of devastated me. And a lot of
the guys (workers) were devastated, too. They came up to
me and said, 'Hey, this is disrespect. I wish I could
catch the guy.' "
After
a rash of vandalism caused more than $50,000 in damage
in November 1995, the Sacramento City Council spent
$40,000 for guards and other security measures to
protect the historic cemetery.
But
Bettencourt said the vandalism Sunday showed the effort
wasn't enough. He said the cemetery needs to be
recognized as an historic treasure and be protected with
extensive night-time security, including motion sensors
and improved lighting.
"Every
time someone damages a stone, they're not just damaging
pieces of rock," he said. "They're damaging
pieces of history."
Bettencourt
said some of the toppled stones were so heavy it was
likely that more than one person was involved.
Meanwhile,
he led a somber tour. He stopped at a broken tombstone
that was still wrapped in police tape from the 1995
desecration. Then he walked to a marbled family stone
honoring a mother who died in 1861 and her 1-year-old
baby who died in 1856. Vandals broke it in three places
back in the 1940s or '50s, and it was put back together
with heavy mortar.
This
is not a new problem, Bettencourt said. But he wondered
why it couldn't be stopped.
"If
someone walked into the Crocker Museum and slashed
'Yosemite' by Thomas Hill, how long would it take the
city to take the steps to see it would never happen
again?" he asked. "They would do anything to
protect that valuable piece of art. But look what we
have here, and we're not protected."
Reprinted
from the Sacramento Bee's www.sacbee.com.
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