A favorite out and about activity of ours (my family and friends, especially my kids and my husband and my friend Amelia) is exploring old cemeteries and graveyards. Each and every grave and memorial has a story, even if it isn’t always obvious. We explore these places with respect, and are always thoughtful about not only those who are there, but those they left behind.

I live in a town called Orangevale, which is an unincorporated area of Sacramento County. Where I live is where the towns of Orangevale, Fair Oaks, and the City of Folsom all come together. Seriously there are no straight borders. I go two blocks and I’m in one town, two blocks and I’m in another. Anyway, the town of Fair Oaks has a beautiful historic cemetery, which is still active. As far as I know there are no public cemeteries in Orangevale, but there might be some farm cemeteries and family plots going back to the 1800’s. In the City of Folsom, which goes back to California Gold Rush Times, there are five cemeteries. Saint John the Baptist Catholic Church Cemetery, FO.E. 929 Cemetery, Young Yo Memorial Cemetery Site, China Mission-Chung Was Chinese Cemetery, and The Lakeside Memorial Cemetery.

Until recently, maybe about five or six years ago, I had never been to The Lakeside Memorial Cemetery, or even knew much about it. I know people with family members there, but like I said, I’d never been there. I would drive past it, and I could see it across the lake from my neighborhood, and always sort of wondered about it. Anyway, one cool fall day in 2016 my daughter and I decided to check it out.

The grounds are beautifully covered in Oak and other beautiful large shade trees. In the historic areas graves go back to 1846. Most of the areas we walked in were somewhat contemporary. For some unknown reason, at least unknown at the time, I seemed to be drawn to a section in the back towards the direction of the lake. I came upon an area that was in some ways both beautiful, but exceptionally sad. All of the grave markers were children and young people. These were not babies or toddlers (as sadly seen too often, especially in older cemeteries) but older children, and mostly teens or people in their early 20’s. I found it profoundly sad and tragic. One larger marker showed the face of a teenage boy, and the inscription from his parents saying, “We are so sorry. We wish we would have done more.” A suicide. We suspected a few others were as well.

But getting back to why I was there…

It was as if everyone there, all of those young people, were saying “do not forget us. Please do not forget us. We were here.”

I visited there a few months later, just because I needed a place to sit and read for a bit between appointments.

About a year later, on a cold winter morning I was on the way to the post office. My dog was in the back of my car because on the way home I was going to stop by the cemetery and walk her around, and maybe look at some of the historic areas.

So on the way to the post office, while I waited at the light and glanced over to the cemetery sign I heard a voice, as clear as if I was to speak to you now if you were here sitting next to me. It said, “You are not welcome here.”

This chilled me to the bone. Needless to say my dog and I did not go there that day, and I have never gone there again.

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A while back I posted some photos from Saint John the Baptist Catholic Cemetery in Folsom, CA. It is just down the street from Lakeside Memorial. No ghosts, or at least none that have shown themselves to me.

~ Juliette aka Vampire Maman

SMALL GHOSTS – ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST CEMETERY

One day a while back I decided to stop by the old St. John the Baptist Catholic Cemetery in Folsom, CA (this is really an old-fashioned graveyard.) You’ll find no lavish crypts here. It is a small plot of about two or three acres and a small church founded in 1853. Yes, this was the Gold Rush Era in California. Irish emigrants came here to find their fortunes, make a better life and for many, die before their time. Unfortunately like many cemeteries of that time a high number of the graves are those of children and young people in their teens and twenties. Deaths at a young age were not unexpected, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t tragic or heartbreaking to their families and friends.

My brother Max walked alone for a bit while my daughter and I looked for stories in the headstone inscriptions.

We didn’t feel any ghosts in this place. We never have. Everyone had moved on or moved elsewhere. Maybe under a full moon or an anniversary there might be the spirit of one of the occupants, but the place has never felt overly haunted like other places of the dead. You might find them (ghosts) walking the banks of the lake or sitting on the edge of the bluffs, but not here where they were laid to rest so long ago.

That isn’t quite the entire story. In the back, along the fence is the lone grave of a small child. She didn’t live during the Gold Rush but a much later addition. Her name was Julie Ann and she lived from 1975 to 1983. Over the years her grave has been visited by strangers but there is no sign of anyone around who loved or cared about her. Her stone is covered with dirt, lichen and leaves. She is alone, far from the family graves of children who lived in the nineteenth century.  I hope she was loved. More than anything I hope she isn’t there.

As a rule I hate ghosts, but the small ones are sad little things that need to move on and have their peace.

Clara jolted Max out of his revelries by bumping on his arm and asking, “So, Uncle Max, how long do you plan on having the squirrel on your face?”

“Excuse me?” Max looked annoyed.

“The beard. I think it looks good,” I told him. It does looks good – short and neat, not one of those shaggy things.

“You should shave it off. But I like the glasses,” said Clara. Like a lot of teenage girls, Clara thinks glasses on good-looking guys is ultra hot. She wandered off to look at more stones and find things to tell her friends about.

Max stopped by one of the older stones and smiled. The inscription was of a 21-year-old women from Ireland who died in 1862. She’d come all the way to California only to quickly die.

My brother glanced at me. “She isn’t there.”

Anyway, for those of you who are traveling around Northern California or in  the Sacramento area and looking for something to do on a Saturday or Sunday check out Folsom. You can visit St. John the Baptist then talk a walk down historic Sutter Street, have lunch, shop or stop by and have a beer at one of the many fine pubs. Walk down to the old Powerhouse or across the old footbridge and get a first class view of the beautiful Rainbow Bridge and Lake Natoma. Bring your bicycles and ride around the lake on the American River Bike Trail. Or head over to the Folsom Zoo where you can see the most amazing assortment of wild animals (from bears to hawks to monkeys) who have been rescued and can no longer survive in the wild on their own. Then take a drive over to Folsom Dam. There used to be water in the lake before the drought (really, I kid you not.) You can also see the famous Folsom Prison which is right next to the lake. Maybe you’ll hear the ghost of Johnny Cash singing in the hills (I doubt that too but it sure would be cool.)

~ Juliette aka Vampire Maman

First published in 2015