MOUNT VERNON — One of the historic landmarks of Mount Vernon is Mound View Cemetery, and one of the historic landmarks of the cemetery is the old water tower.
Made of riveted cast iron painted baby blue, standing on the western edge of the grounds bordered by Mansfield Avenue, the tower — approximately 60 feet tall and capable of holding 150,000 gallons of water — seems curiously out of place in a cemetery. But it was erected there in 1889 to provide improved water pressure for the houses in the neighborhood.
The tower is empty now and is no longer used, and the city is considering what to do with it, said Dave Glass, safety-service director.
“We’re actually doing some investigation on it to see if it has any historical significance because of its age and its makeup,” said Glass. “If it has no significance, we’ll probably tear it down. But if it has some historical significance, we’ll probably maintain it better.”
Its stone base sets at 1,157 feet above sea level, near the highest point in the cemetery, an ancient mound that is at 1,169 elevation. According to the cemetery’s brochure, the mound was opened in 1845 and a skeleton was found, speculated to be that of an Adena Indian, a group that lived in Ohio from 1,000 B.C. to 200 A.D. In 1894, sextons digging a grave along one side of the mound found more bones, an iron tomahawk-pipe, a copper breastplate and bracelet, and a shell necklace.
Jim Gibson, who heads up the Knox County Historical Society, said the artifacts aren’t in the society’s collection and he doesn’t know where they are.
“But I wish I did,” he said, speculating that they may have been passed down to descendants who don’t realize their historical value.
Today, several graves and crypts dot the mound and a driveway winds around it, but its shape is still that of an ancient man-made mound. Gibson noted that when the mound was explored and as new graves began to be dug there, many letters to the editor were written to protest the activity or express consternation.
Geoff Oliver, superintendent of the City Parks Department as well as the Buildings and Lands Department, was enlisted as tower tour guide. He leaned an orange 10-foot Fiberglas ladder against the tower, so that its very top step was near the bottom rung of the blue metal ladder bolted to the tower’s side.
Young men mowing the lawn paused to chuckle and speculate on who would lose courage and give up first.
One at a time, visitors scrambled up the ladder and held tight to the rungs, slowly pulling themselves up the 40 rungs, their hands and clothes turning baby blue with paint dust. The young men went back to work without comment.
At the top of the ladder, visitors stretched to touch the edge of the peaked metal roof, its cutaway portion above their heads, but it remained more than a foot away. There is no apparent access to the top of the roof from the metal ladder.
From 60 feet on high, the view is spectacular, over the leafy trees, down on the roofs of nearby houses and out across the cemetery grounds that gently slope downward toward Wooster Road. The wind whipped the scent of flowering shrubs to the top of the tower, the sides of which remain chilly, even in the warm spring sunshine.
Below lie graves of the prominent and of regular folk, the Ransom family vault with its quirky architecture, the 200-crypt mausoleum built in 1924, Calvary Cemetery — established in 1849 — managed by St. Vincent de Paul Catholic Church, the Curtis family plot with the huge stone slab that covers the opening to the family crypt below the sod and monuments and statues, large and small.
Deb Briscoe, foreman, said the cemetery was founded in 1833. The chapel, built in 1887, is being restored, adding electrical service and repairing ceilings and walls.
“It’s a long-term process,” she said, “and not a cheap thing to do.”
New water lines have been laid alongside the cemetery’s roadways — the old leaky ones running through the cemetery are no longer in use — and new water hydrants have been installed. Mound View Cemetery and its monuments have been the target of much malicious vandalism over many decades, including the old hydrants turned on and left running overnight to cause flood damage. The new hydrants have automatic shut-offs.
The Knox County On High series will conclude with a June 2 report on the experience of the ultimate high place: A hot air balloon ride over the county. The weather-dependent adventure will unfold at first morning light one day this week when conditions are pronounced by the balloonist to be perfect.
