Saturday, October 27, 2007

Cemetery Angels, Orange history tour & Placentia

The "Cemetery Angels," Ann Nepsa and daughter Melanie Goss, volunteer their time to help preserve and research Orange County's historic cemeteries. Their work in identifying exactly who's buried at Yorba Cemetery has been quite impressive, especially considering how many of the grave markers and records were either damaged or missing completely. Moreover, they also give tours at Yorba Cemetery and the adjacent Peralta Adobe. [The photo above shows Ann (right) and Melanie (left) at the 2006 Anaheim Historical Home Tour.] The Oct. 25 issue of the Yorba Linda Star included an article about Ann. A few excerpts follow:
…The 25-year Yorba Linda resident - along with her daughter, Melanie Goss - has been giving tours of the Yorba Cemetery and conducting history research of the families buried there for seven years. …More than 400 members of the early families that lived in the town of Yorba - names such as Peralta, Sepulveda,
Grijalva, De los Reyes, Navarro, Yorba, and about 14 others, are buried at the
private cemetery...
.
There were 139 headstones identified when Nepsa and her daughter began volunteering, and since then they’ve found the names of close to 70 others…
.
“We started in the Anaheim Cemetery," [said Nepsa.] "I was doing my genealogy and I discover some of my husbands’ relatives had been buried there. When the new parks ranger came to the Yorba Cemetery, he had never done research at historical sites, so we volunteered and he allowed us to do our thing. Up to then it was only open twice a year and now it’s open 14 times a year.”
In the days leading up to Halloween, I'll also post a ghost story about Yorba Cemetery, so stay tuned.

Tomorrow, I plan to be at the Old Town Preservation Association's historic home tour in Downtown Orange. If you're there, and if you see me before I see you, please stop and say hello. Details about the tour are available on OTPA's website.

Halloween News: The historic Bradford House in Placentia's Bradford Park (136 Palm Circle) has been turned into a haunted house for kids this weekend. It will be open 6:30-9pm and admission is $5.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Seems to be the weekend of events.
In the forgotten Northwest corner of Orange County, the La Habra Old Settlers group is having their annual potluck at the La Habra Library. Sunday 1 pm.

Chris Jepsen said...

I'm happy to post these events if people tell me about them a bit in advance. In fact, I really appreciate getting this kind of info.