NEW YORK FOLKLORE QUARTERLY
Vol. XVIII, No. 4, Winter, 1962

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HERE LIES SCHROON LAKE
Lewis Haberly

“FOR the informal historian, the most direct way to get an intimate sense of America’s past is to walk through a quiet country graveyard where crumbling tombstones still speak vividly of forgotten people.“ From these early tombstones with their numerous epitaphs, much of the early history of a town or area can be revealed with a little study. A fact that is certainly true of the graveyards in the Schroon Lake area.

The oldest cemetery in Schroon Lake is the Baker Street Cemetery, located in South Schroon. This cemetery was established around the year 1810 on Baker property. The earliest marked grave is dated February 27, 1810. This grave, however, may not be the earliest, due to the fact that many of the earliest settlers could not afford granite tombstones that would survive the destructive forces of time. Many of the earliest graves were marked by wooden crosses or plain rocks that soon disappeared. Many of the gravestones in these early cemeteries have also been removed and used for such things as steps or walks by thoughtless people. Unfortunately, only about half the original stones remain in the Baker Street Cemetery.

In this cemetery, many of the early settlers in Schroon, such as the Bakers and the Rawsons, are buried. There are also graves of several veterans from the War of 1812 and the Civil War. As is true of all old cemeteries this one has several epitaphs which tell bits of advice or sentiment and which may reflect personalities, sentiments or religious beliefs. One epitaph appears on the grave of Jesse Taylor, who died in 1877 at the age of 75. It reads:

He died to live, not live to die.
The form of earthy day....
Is but a shadow on the sky,
That quickly fades away.
Though sorrowing hearts around him
And tears bedim the sight,
How sweet to know a spirit band
Is aiding in his flight.

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