Working to preserve local history

A pair of Five Towns residents are working to maintain and repair the Lawrence Cemetery at 135 Rockaway Turnpike in Lawrence, a site that includes the remains of some of the area’s most famous names.

“We really just want to clean it up and preserve it,” Sabrina Zorovich said. Robert Bey and Zorovich, of Cedarhurst and Lawrence, respectively, and both Lawrence High School alumni, are looking for help to restore the cemetery across the street from the Alliance Christian Missionary at 150 Rockaway Turnpike. The church is responsible for the property, but does not have the financial means to maintain it, Zorovich and Bey said. 

The duo began investigating and cleaning up the roughly one-acre site in October 2015. They stumbled on the unmarked cemetery, behind a building off Rockaway Turnpike, while visiting relatives buried in the nearby St. Mary Star of the Sea Cemetery. They saw how decrepit the place had become — full of fallen trees and brush, and broken or damaged gravestones. 

Notable Five Towns founding community members’ names are etched on gravestones throughout the cemetery, including Petit, Brower, Cornell, Sprague, Wanser, Pearsall, Craft, Hicks, Mott and Wood. Some of these names can now be seen on local streets. “There’s so many educational opportunities here because of the history,” Bey, a forensic scientist who also studied archaeology, said, “In my mind, it’s the ultimate archaeological site.”

Although Bey and Zorovich have been the sole volunteers involved with the cleanup, the Peninsula Public Library replaced the fence separating its parking lot from the cemetery to aid in the process. 

Library Director Carolynn Matulewicz, an Inwood native said, “It’s the heritage. It’s the community. It was so nice to see that these people wanted to take this on.” She said there was enough money left in the library’s budget to fix the fence in May. The Regency apartment building next to the library also repaired its fence to improve its condition and appearance.

Local historian Millicent Vollono, who wrote a book about the history of the Five Towns and worked at the Hewlett-Woodmere library as a reference librarian for nearly 30 years, said that the cemetery was once affiliated with the Lawrence Methodist Episcopal Church. Generations of people from that congregation are buried in the cemetery. 

Vollono said that before the Alliance Christian Missionary moved into the space across from the cemetery, it housed McKendre’s Chapel, which was built in 1831 and is the oldest church in the Rockaway area. “The original building burned down in 1866 and another building replaced it before the current structure was erected in 1908,” she said. 

A spokesperson from the church could not be reached for comment by press time. Zorovich and Bey said they have been given permission from the church, the property owner, to conduct the cleanup. 

They are organizing a cleanup for this Saturday and Sunday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. to clear out the overgrown weeds, shrubs and trees, and to salvage and preserve what they can of the gravestones. 

Zorovich and Bey invite local residents and business owners to volunteer for the effort. They are asking for financial donations, lawn mowers, wood chippers and other outdoor tools. They said they hope to obtain landmark status for the cemetery and create a historical society to keep the project going long-term. More information is available on the Lawrence Cemetery Restoration Project Facebook page, www.facebook.com/TheLawrenceCemetery/.

Have an opinion about how to preserve local history? Send your letter to the editor to jbessen@liherald.com.