Guthrie chairs the Ohio Genealogical Society's cemetery committee and has cataloged known Ohio cemeteries. Guthrie said Ohio has 13,100 cemeteries, according to the society's last published inventory in 1978, and another 2,000 are expected to be added by 2003. About two-thirds are private, she estimated. Although no state laws govern abandoned family cemeteries, certainly there is an etiquette that people should follow if they discover a burial site on their property, said Columbus lawyer Robert Sexton, an expert in cemetery law. If I bought an acre and there was a graveyard on it, I'd put a fence around it and maintain it,'' Sexton said.
Religious ethicists agree.
I am very conservative about cemeteries and the places that are holy and sacred to communities and to different faith groups,'' said Rabbi Harold Berman of Congregation Tifereth Israel in Columbus. I would be very loathe to disturb such a place. In Hocking County, the buried remain on the Carters' land, their tombstones commemorating them at the nearby Asbury cemetery. It is a compromise that should please everyone, Vermillion hopes, because he and the other trustees are weary of the dispute. If they're happy, I'm happy,'' he said.