Here's an article from the paper about that cemetery rededication I'll be going to in a couple weeks. The book project I'm involved with is mentioned, too.
New gates for Jewish cemetery
June 29 dedication celebrates 'the entire thing'
June 16, 2008 12:13:00 AM
By Nancy Pasternack/Appeal-Democrat
It was all a case of misfiled paperwork.
A deed to the acre or so of land that became the Marysville Jewish cemetery in the 1850s had been placed under "sellers" rather than "buyers" at the Yuba County records office.
Prompted by questions from visitors to the cemetery, Dick Marquette, a former Marysville postman and amateur research historian, dug through those records in 1993 and discovered the filing error --- and the deed.
"It's not that I'm nosy," said Marquette, now 78, of his sleuthing, "but I get interested in all kinds of things."
The recovered document prompted publication of articles in the San Francisco Chronicle and in The Forward, a Jewish newspaper in New York, and sparked interest for further research, and a series of restoration projects.
On June 29, Congregation Beth Shalom and the Judah L. Magnes Museum's Commission for the Preservation of Pioneer Jewish Cemeteries and Landmarks will dedicate newly erected entry gates to the Marysville Pioneer Jewish Cemetery with a series of events, including a luncheon and the airing of a PBS documentary.
The gates, which once stood at the perimeter of a Jewish cemetery in San Francisco, spent more than a century in storage after most of that city's grave sites were transferred in the 1870s to then-rural Daly City and Colma, nearby.
After spending a decade at the Judah L. Magnes Museum in Berkeley, then a few more at Marquette's home in Sutter, the gates were installed at the Marysville cemetery late last year.
"They're very heavy and we needed pillars to hold them," said Beth Shalom member Barbara Fruitman, one of the project's key organizers.
"We had to get brick layers and iron workers," said Paul Solomon, a trustee of the Magnes Jewish cemeteries board. Solomon, who has begun work with Fruitman on a pictorial history book about Jews during the Gold Rush, is scheduled to speak at the dedication.
Solomon, a Portland resident, has been conducting historical research related to the Marysville Jewish cemetery and other Jewish cemeteries in the region for more than 15 years.
A Yuba County court granted trusteeship of the cemetery to the Magnes Museum in 1994, and the first surveying projects got under way.
Funds for the initial restoration projects at the Marysville cemetery came primarily from San Francisco-based Jewish philanthropies.
When workers first began, "The weeds were taller than me, the headstones were broken, and it had flooded so often there was soot and soil and garbage totally covering everything," Solomon said.
Local restoration efforts have improved much of the rest of the Marysville cemetery, Solomon explained. The upcoming dedication "is a celebration of the entire thing," he said.
Of seven cemeteries restored through Solomon's group, the one in Marysville's pioneer cemetery is the largest, with 55 headstones. It also is the only one that has had a "continuing Jewish presence since the beginning," he said.
The other cemeteries are in Sonora, Grass Valley, Nevada City, Placerville, Jackson and Mokelumne.
June 29 dedication celebrates 'the entire thing'
June 16, 2008 12:13:00 AM
By Nancy Pasternack/Appeal-Democrat
It was all a case of misfiled paperwork.
A deed to the acre or so of land that became the Marysville Jewish cemetery in the 1850s had been placed under "sellers" rather than "buyers" at the Yuba County records office.
Prompted by questions from visitors to the cemetery, Dick Marquette, a former Marysville postman and amateur research historian, dug through those records in 1993 and discovered the filing error --- and the deed.
"It's not that I'm nosy," said Marquette, now 78, of his sleuthing, "but I get interested in all kinds of things."
The recovered document prompted publication of articles in the San Francisco Chronicle and in The Forward, a Jewish newspaper in New York, and sparked interest for further research, and a series of restoration projects.
On June 29, Congregation Beth Shalom and the Judah L. Magnes Museum's Commission for the Preservation of Pioneer Jewish Cemeteries and Landmarks will dedicate newly erected entry gates to the Marysville Pioneer Jewish Cemetery with a series of events, including a luncheon and the airing of a PBS documentary.
The gates, which once stood at the perimeter of a Jewish cemetery in San Francisco, spent more than a century in storage after most of that city's grave sites were transferred in the 1870s to then-rural Daly City and Colma, nearby.
After spending a decade at the Judah L. Magnes Museum in Berkeley, then a few more at Marquette's home in Sutter, the gates were installed at the Marysville cemetery late last year.
"They're very heavy and we needed pillars to hold them," said Beth Shalom member Barbara Fruitman, one of the project's key organizers.
"We had to get brick layers and iron workers," said Paul Solomon, a trustee of the Magnes Jewish cemeteries board. Solomon, who has begun work with Fruitman on a pictorial history book about Jews during the Gold Rush, is scheduled to speak at the dedication.
Solomon, a Portland resident, has been conducting historical research related to the Marysville Jewish cemetery and other Jewish cemeteries in the region for more than 15 years.
A Yuba County court granted trusteeship of the cemetery to the Magnes Museum in 1994, and the first surveying projects got under way.
Funds for the initial restoration projects at the Marysville cemetery came primarily from San Francisco-based Jewish philanthropies.
When workers first began, "The weeds were taller than me, the headstones were broken, and it had flooded so often there was soot and soil and garbage totally covering everything," Solomon said.
Local restoration efforts have improved much of the rest of the Marysville cemetery, Solomon explained. The upcoming dedication "is a celebration of the entire thing," he said.
Of seven cemeteries restored through Solomon's group, the one in Marysville's pioneer cemetery is the largest, with 55 headstones. It also is the only one that has had a "continuing Jewish presence since the beginning," he said.
The other cemeteries are in Sonora, Grass Valley, Nevada City, Placerville, Jackson and Mokelumne.
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He'll tell ya hehehehehehehe
