Cleaning the Gravestones

In May 2023, Carl Hughes, of Meadowlark Memorials and Wilf Bruch from the Old Cemeteries Society came to the cemetery to give their perspectives about caring for our historic graves.

Moss eats away at the concrete and will destroy it in time. Removing the moss will preserve the stone for longer. Following Carl’s presentation, Amber Woods cleaned the ledger stones for Rabbi Marcus Berner, Aaron Shnitka, Sarah Shnitka, Leah Black, and Minnie Berman.

However, the question is now being discussed at the Cemetery Committee about whether it would be better to clean the graves to preserve them or leave the moss as it gives the graves an older look and is part of a natural process.

In the meantime, the process of cleaning the headstones has begun.

This blog will chronicle the work.

In July 2023, Amber Woods began the first cleaning of the headstones in Phoebe Levy’s family plot.

On August 8, 2023, Amber was joined by Laura Rosenberg and Andy Muchin and most of the graves in Eva Levy’s family plot got their first cleaning. The next step is to apply the chemical D-2 which will remove remaining moss and lichen.

On Sunday, August 13, 2023 Amber was joined by Leah and Peter Freedman. Finishing touches were given to the Levy family plot. Following are before and after photos taken by Leah Freedman.

Esther Levy

David Hart

Bennie Levy

Laura Rosenberg and Andy Muchin joined Amber Woods at the cemetery to clean the Franck grave of Mollie and Julius Franck. Laura and Andy began by cleaning the headstone while Amber removed bits of moss from the ledger stone. Laura continued to work on the headstone while Andy and Amber used dish detergent and water on the ledger stone. When she was finished, Laura became the water bearer bringing water in a small bucket from the sink to the grave site. Slowly the tiles began to emerge from their cocoon of schmutz which has been building up for decades.

Phoebe, Annie and Joseph Levy’s family plot before and after moss cleaning.

Shoshana Litman and Laura Rosenberg joined Amber Woods in cleaning the grave of Isador Braverman. Laura and Shoshana worked on the headstone before moving onto the tiled surface. Amber focused on the tiles.

A couple who would like to remain anonymous joined Amber Woods after they had done some gardening at the Zachor Wall to complete the cleaning of Isador Braverman’s grave.

Under the direction of Professor Erin McGuire, a handful of students from last semester’s class and a few other people came to the cemetery to clean headstones along the main pathway.

The first step is to clean the graves with a little soapy water and a lot of elbow grease. Then the chemical D-2 would be applied. D-2 is a cleaning product designed to remove harmful bacteria and pollutants which stain stonework. As a test to see how well the product works after one application, a face on the top of Joseph Davies grave was treated. D-2 was sprayed on and left to work. Three graves were treated with D-2; Enrica Glickman, Grace Meiss, and Rebecca Harris.

The headstones for Mary Brill, Martha Elkan, Frances Shaw, Joy Montague, Patricia Montague, Charles Rapp and Samuel Ruskin were cleaned with soap and water and will be treated with D-2 at a later date. The following images were taken by Leah Freedman.

Busy at cleaning:

Before and After: