CEMETERY’S DUAL OWNERSHIP “Worst Case Scenario”: Marshall

By Paul Bagnell

Tribune Staff Writer

[Welland Tribune, 29 April 1987]

WELLAND- The future of the 145-year old Price Cemetery is still in doubt, despite a recently completed search of its ownership.

The cemetery, on the bank of the Welland River off Colbeck Drive, is the burial site of at least eight descendants of David Price, said to be the first white settler in Welland.

City solicitor Barbara Moloney has presented the results of title search on the cemetery and has concluded it is split between two owners-the Toronto, Hamilton and Buffalo Railroad Company and Lindel Investments Ltds., a Welland firm.

However, Anthony Whelan, a local amateur genealogist, disputes Moloney’s reading of the title search and says he plans to continue pressing the city to restore the cemetery from its unkempt and neglected condition.

Whelan says the cemetery belongs exclusively to Lindel Investments. Lindel is willing to sell it to the city for $1, and Whelan says the Ontario Cemeteries Act obliges the city to take over the cemetery and maintain it.

The surveyor’s document produced by the title search shows the area of the cemetery once bounded by a wire fence to be entirely on Lindel’s property. Moloney and Whelan differ on a small triangular section of land between the fence line and the road, owned by the railroad. Moloney’s report to council says it is part of the cemetery. Whelan says it is not.

The issue hinges further on differing interpretations of the Cemeteries Act, which makes municipalities responsible for cemeteries within their boundaries “where the owner of a cemetery cannot be found or is unknown or is unable to maintain it.”

A spokesman for Lindel Investments says the company “isn’t in the cemetery business,” and is willing to give the small plot of land to the city.

Ald. George Marshall, chairman of the parks, recreation and arena committee, says the cemetery “will be maintained,” but isn’t so sure the responsibility falls to the city. He said the committee will decide its position after discussing the matter in an upcoming meeting.

If the city decides it has not responsibility to maintain the cemetery, it will urge its owner-or owners to do so, he said. Marshall calls the possibility of dual ownership “the worst case scenario,” from the city’s point of view.

The Lindel spokesman, who asked not to be named, said the firm offered to give up its interest in the cemetery 10 years ago. The city expressed interest but never followed through.

“It’s not the guy who bought the land,” who is responsible for the upkeep of the cemetery”, the spokesman said. “We never buried anyone there.”

Marshall, however, felt the act was clear in stating that an owner capable of taking care of a cemetery must do so. He also said the committee is reluctant to set a precedent in this case that would force it to take on other, larger cemeteries in the future.

The city has been asked to maintain the Smith Street Cemetery by the cemetery’s board of trustees, but has resisted in doing so.

“We’re not in the business of looking around for more things to keep up,” he said. “It’s my understanding that the (Price) cemetery will be kept up-it’s just a matter of who.”

Whelan agrees with the Lindel spokesman that the company is not in a position to take care of the cemetery. He says the fact the cemetery is abandoned makes it a municipal obligation.

The cemetery sits on the west bank of the Welland River, on Colbeck drive south of Webber Road. The only visible headstone bears the name Sarah Hutson, a member of the Price family who married a man named James Hutson.

Whelan has investigated the cemetery’s history and says at least eight and possibly ten members of the Price family are buried there.

The first recorded burial on the site, Whelan says, took place in 1842. He suspects, however, that Elisha Price-the first member of the family to own the property on which the cemetery sits, is also buried there, along with his wife.

David Price himself is not buried there. In the mid-1960s, his tombstone was found near Denistoun Street and the Welland River. Whelan believes his body may have been moved for the Colbeck Drive site at one point.

The Welland Historical Society is also concerned about the cemetery’s condition. Whelan has visited similar tiny cemeteries in Ancaster and Clinton which are maintained by municipal authorities. Neither are accessible by road, he says.