PLOTS TO THINK ABOUT : Wander Through Some Local Cemeteries and Have Visions of the Past

In the midst of life, we are in death!

From Santa Ana Cemetery

tombstone of Alice A. MacDowell

(died March 21, 1887, at age 32)

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Orange County’s development boom, which heated up after World War II and finally cooled off in the ‘80s, didn’t pause for sentiment. What shards of local history lingered among the once-quiet main streets and orange groves were no match for the stucco tide of progress, which washed most of the old county away, leaving only tiny pieces bobbing like bits of flotsam.

Finding an island of timelessness amid all the change, a place to stand and get a sense of the past, is no easy task, but one bastion of history lives on where the people who made it lie buried. At Orange County’s older cemeteries, suburbia is held at the gate.

At Anaheim Cemetery, hemmed in by tract houses on all sides, it is possible to wander among elaborate tombstones dating back to the 1860s. Many of the epitaphs are in German, a reminder that the founders of this city came from halfway around the world to what must then have seemed a wilderness.

Even in another language, it is easy to read how the difficulties of the journey and of building a life in a new land took its toll; many of the men and women buried here are in their 20s and 30s.

Going even deeper into the past, the graves in Yorba Cemetery in Yorba Linda hold members of some of the area’s pioneering Spanish families: Yorba, Carrillo, Peralta, Dominguez, Castillo, Mendoza, Sepulveda.

At Santa Ana Cemetery, founded in 1870, some of the county’s later pioneers were lain to rest, their names--Edinger, McFadden--familiar to most everyone, from street signs if not from a knowledge of local history. Here, as in all graveyards, the lesser-known names have stories to tell, too. In one corner, three graves lie side-by-side, all of them belonging to the young children of Josiah and Sarah Ross, with dates of death between 1870 and 1882.

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For many of us, cemeteries provoke something between morbid curiosity and superstitious fear. When I lived in Northern California as a preteen, our school bus passed an isolated Gold Rush-era cemetery every day, and often we dared each other to take our sleeping bags and spend the night within its gates. We never got the nerve.

The ghoulish side of the graveyard mystique is at its peak this time of year, when children dress as ghosts and parents pound wooden crosses into the front lawn. Mocking death, and our fear of mortality, is a time-honored tradition.

As an adult, though, I’ve come to enjoy cemeteries on their own terms. On trips, I rarely pass an old graveyard without walking through; often there’s no better way to get a sense of place. Cemeteries force you to read between the lines and fill in the stories of the lives that came before, lending a resonance to the human landscape.

Graveyards are quiet too, conducive to contemplation, and the best ones are long on atmosphere. There’s nothing in Orange County to match the drama of a Civil War cemetery or the other-worldliness of an above-ground New Orleans graveyard. Still, there are pockets worth exploring for those in tune with their quiet charms.

And, of course, there is no better place to think upon questions of mortality, although such issues hang heavily enough without so blunt a reminder as the one I found recently at the Santa Ana Cemetery. It was etched on the tombstone of Lena Coepper, wife of C.M. Coepper, who died at 24 on April 6, 1890.

Remember, friends, as you pass by

As you are now, so once was I

As I am now, soon you will be

Prepare for death and follow me.

Following is a sampling of some of Orange County’s older and more atmospheric cemeteries, an OC Live! guide to the O.C. dead.

* Mission San Juan Capistrano: Within the walls of the mission proper, a collection of weathered wooden crosses crowds a small yard outside the Serra Chapel. The dates and names have long since worn off, and the crosses that still stand are but a fraction of what once marked the mission grounds, which used to be much more extensive.

Many of the old graves are now under nearby streets and developments.

“No archeology was done (before construction) back before the ‘70s, and a lot of the streets were built right over burial grounds,” said Charles A. Bodnar, archivist for the mission.

The mission was founded in 1776 by Junipero Serra. Most of those buried there over the early years were local Indians converted by the Franciscan missionaries, including several dozen killed when the mission church collapsed in the earthquake of 1812.

There is little idea of how many are buried around the mission or where their graves are.

“There just never really was a map of the burial ground that we know of,” Bodnar said.

When the mission grounds filled up, another cemetery was opened nearby. Now called the Old Mission Cemetery, it is across Interstate 5 from the mission, up a narrow driveway off Ortega Highway. The grounds are usually locked, but it is possible to arrange a visit through the mission office.

This quiet hilltop site also is covered with numerous wooden crosses, the names and dates gone, along with some more elaborate graves, including a small mausoleum holding the remains of several members of the pioneering Forster family, which once controlled more than 200,000 acres locally (including the mission itself).

The mission is at 31522 Camino Capistrano, San Juan Capistrano. Open daily, 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.; entry is $4. Information: (714) 248-2049.

* Yorba Cemetery: One of the state’s oldest private cemeteries, this one is predated in Orange County only by the cemetery at the mission. Yorba Cemetery was part of the 13,328-acre Rancho Canon de Santa Ana, granted to Bernardo Yorba by the Mexican governor in 1834.

Don Bernardo himself was buried there in 1858; also buried there are 20 of his 21 children. In all, more than 120 graves have been identified, but it is believed that there may be as many as 600 people buried there. Yorba deeded the cemetery to the Catholic Church not long before his death; the historic site was acquired by the county in 1966.

Popular legend has it that this cemetery is also inhabited by at least one ghost. Alvina Yorba de Los Reyes was 31 when she died in a carriage accident on her way home from a party in 1910. The story goes that she was wearing a pink formal gown, and a ghost known as the Pink Lady is said to appear at the grave site in June of even-numbered years.

The cemetery, 200 feet square, sits incongruously in the middle of a condominium complex off Esperanza Road, next to a community tennis court and playground. Until the late 1970s, it was possible to wander the lushly overgrown site unsupervised, but vandalism put a stop to that.

Now, the gates on the iron fence are locked, and the better groomed site is open only to guided tours.

Yorba Cemetery is at 6749 Parkwood Court, Yorba Linda. Information: (714) 528-4260.

* Anaheim Cemetery: This still-active cemetery was dedicated in 1867 by the German founders of Anaheim. It is a 14-acre, tree-shaded oasis in the midst of suburban tract houses in the northern part of the city.

Some of the older tombstones are among the most intricately carved in the county, with epitaphs often written in German and listing birthplaces from Hanover to Munich. Later burials include the founders of Placentia and Westminster.

Anaheim Cemetery is one of four burial places in the Orange County Cemetery District, the others being El Toro Memorial Park in Lake Forest, Magnolia Memorial Park in Garden Grove and Santa Ana Cemetery. Each was founded before 1900, but Anaheim is the oldest.

Anaheim Cemetery is at 1400 E. Sycamore St., Anaheim. Open daily, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Information: (714) 535-4928.

* Santa Ana Cemetery: This historic graveyard, final resting place for many of the county’s early movers and shakers, was founded in 1870. Its 29 acres are now encompassed in the larger Fairhaven Memorial Park, giving it a quiet and idyllic buffer from the surrounding development.

This is probably the county’s best cemetery for longish strolls, with a large number and variety of grave markers spanning much of the county’s early history. Familiar names are sprinkled in among the area’s forgotten pioneers.

Santa Ana Cemetery is at 1919 E. Santa Clara Ave., Santa Ana. Open daily, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Information: (714) 953-2959.

* Holy Sepulchre Cemetery: This site is not as old as the others on the list (burials date back to the 1930s), and the markers are generally unadorned and flush with the grass.

It rates a mention, however, as the most scenic and serene of the local cemeteries, located on a quiet road on the rolling hills east of Orange with a sweeping view of the Santa Ana Mountains.

Holy Sepulchre Cemetery is at 7845 Santiago Canyon Road, Orange--near Santiago Oaks Regional Park. Open daily, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Information: (714) 532-6551.