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UA study, Richfield native find site's ties to 18th-century soldiers
By Jim Carney
Beacon Journal staff writer
Published on Saturday, Dec 29, 2007
RICHFIELD TWP.: On a sunny December afternoon with snow drifts caressing the 19th-century graves at the Columbia Road Cemetery, Jim Choma's curiosity about who is buried here grows even more.
''There is really a lot that lies quite literally beneath the surface,'' Choma said.
He became fascinated by the cemetery, where some of the township's pioneers are buried, while growing up near it.
A University of Akron Community Archaeology Program study of 50 percent to 70 percent of the quarter-acre cemetery was started in 2006 and completed in the spring. The investigation found evidence of about 38 unmarked graves, in addition to two dozen existing gravestones, said Timothy Matney, associate professor of archaeology at UA.
Researchers and students from UA used mapping devices to determine where graves were located.
They also used electronic resistance meters to determine spots where soil was less compacted, to indicate where people might be buried. And they used magnetic gradiometers to measure fluctuations in the Earth's magnetic field, because areas where graves are located have unique magnetic compositions.
The cemetery is about a mile and a half west of Riverview Road in the 2400 block of Columbia Road.
Choma said the cemetery was believed to have been full at the time of World War I, when he estimates there might have been about 100 people buried there.
Some of the burials might have been on top of another grave, he said, and there is a belief that some graves are in a grassy area outside the cemetery fence.
Time has worn the names and dates off many of the gravestones still here.
Some families might have taken gravestones with them when they moved, Choma said.
And when Columbia Road was widened in the early 19th century, some bodies might have been moved and reburied.
Choma, 37, of Brecksville, is hopeful that more UA archaeological research may be done at the cemetery in 2008. But, he said, a metal fence that surrounds the graveyard may have to be removed so that it does not interfere with the testing.
The cemetery might have started in 1795, when soldiers under Gen. ''Mad'' Anthony Wayne, returning from the previous year's Battle of Fallen Timbers near present-day Toledo, died of a communicable disease and were buried here, Choma said.
He said Wayne camped near the site, and the foundation of a cabin on the site might have originally been a garrison.
''The story is that there was some sort of viral breakout that killed several soldiers,'' said Choma, who works for a local financial company. ''These soldiers were then quickly buried on this land and thus a cemetery was born.''
Matney said the UA study found evidence of a building that might have been a ''keeping house where bodies were stored when the ground was frozen for later burial . . . or some other building that predated the cemetery.''
He said that building appeared to have been a square, four meters on each side.
Snow family
Choma's interest in the cemetery also is focused on the Snow family. Russ Snow, a War of 1812 veteran, his wife and two daughters were buried in the cemetery.
The Snows came to Richfield from Maine in 1835 to escape a tuberculosis outbreak.
The stones of the Snows — plus those of Russ Snow's sister and her husband — were moved from the cemetery to Highland Cemetery in Brecksville for a family reunion in 1896, Choma said.
''The feeling was that since several relatives were coming from Maine, Iowa, Minnesota, and California, it would be best to have them pay their respects in one place rather than making two stops,'' Choma said.
Choma said, Russ' brother, Henry, and his wife, Sarah, are also buried at Columbia Road, but ''there's no sign of their stones here or in Highland Cemetery. Either they were lost to the elements by 1896 or were vandalized.''
This past summer, Choma put small wooden markers on each of the four Snow family graves.
Russ Snow, who was born in 1798, was buried on a snowy day in the winter of 1875, Choma said.
''This is the way it was when he was buried,'' Choma said of the snow that covered the cemetery one day last week.
Choma is writing a book about Snow that will be called Snowville. Snowville Road in nearby Brecksville is named for Snow.
Choma would like to see some digging done on the site of what might have been an Anthony Wayne garrison or the keeping house to find out where the structure was and what it was composed of.
Interest in DNA
He said he also is interested in digging in the area where the Snows were buried and possibly doing ''some DNA testing.''
Bette Klein, great-great-great-granddaughter of Russ Snow who lives in Brecksville, said she would ''entertain the idea'' of DNA testing in her family's burial area.
Klein said she would want to know how the testing would be conducted and what would be done with any information collected.
''It is exciting to see someone looking at it as intently as he is,'' she said of Choma's interest in the cemetery where her ancestors are buried.
Choma said he is intrigued by the mystery of the cemetery.
''All these folks have stories,'' he said.
People often ask Choma why he has so much interest in this little cemetery.
''A question I occasionally get is: Why bother? They're dead, who cares? It's not like these people were famous,'' Choma said. ''Well, I care. Apparently, so do plenty of others. Each life, no matter how brief, has a story to tell.
''We've read countless stories about the lives of great men and women — the politicians, doctors, and lawyers of history — yet some of the greatest stories come from common, everyday people, people like the folks buried in these little pioneer cemeteries.''
To contact Choma about the cemetery, e-mail him at jchoma@msn.com.
Jim Carney can be reached at 330-996-3576 or jcarney@thebeaconjournal.com.
RICHFIELD TWP.: On a sunny December afternoon with snow drifts caressing the 19th-century graves at the Columbia Road Cemetery, Jim Choma's curiosity about who is buried here grows even more.
Get the full article here.
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