It’s the special time of year when the weather is warm, the sky is mostly sunny and hopefully, bright blue with a few white clouds to brighten our days. The last few days of summer also recall family gatherings and vacations enjoying our last days before we reluctantly transition back to school, or in my case, scheduling our final college move-in trip. The opportunities to take advantage of the beautiful summer weather in Cleveland mean that our GPS Apps on our phones are getting a lot of use as we enjoy the benefits of outdoor walks and hiking by utilizing these improved technologies every day.
Recently, on one such beautiful day, a venture into Calvary Cemetery with CCAirwave’s recent podcast guests, Fr. Damian Ference and Michael Hayes, allowed us to utilize the CCA App to locate Fr. Damian’s grandparents who are buried at Calvary Cemetery in Cleveland, Ohio. The App allows you to find the grave location of your loved ones by clicking on the “Find Loved Ones” button and typing their first and last names. A list populates where you can further refine the search by reviewing information such as cemetery name and date of death. Simply click on the name, and more information, such as the age at death, address of record and Section Number, Lot Number and Grave Number are given. This page on the App allows you to click on other buttons to purchase flowers, call the cemetery office, or receive additional details such as driving directions, location maps, and finally, walking directions utilizing GPS, to take you to the gravesite. We literally took a few minutes to drive to the gravesite once we entered the names and found the information for his grandparents. With over 13 miles of roads within Calvary Cemetery, it made sense to drive to the site and then use the walking directions to pinpoint the location of the gravesites. While there, Fr. Damian also prayed at other relatives’ gravesites near his grandparents. It was a perfect use of our CCA App.
I decided to try to identify whether my own relatives had any additional burial sites at Calvary. I have visited the graves of my paternal grandparents and my great aunt and uncle buried next to them. I had often heard that my great grandparents might also be buried at Calvary. Other relatives had mentioned that they did not think there was a headstone for their site, and I wanted to investigate to determine if this was true. I knew my great grandparents’ names and was able to find a record of their location using the App. Much to my delight, after using the GPS to locate the area of their final resting place, I was led to within a few feet of the beautiful rose granite headstone of my ancestors. With assistance from the Main Office, I found that there were three plots with seven of my ancestors buried there, including two infants who died shortly after birth. The great revelation was that one of the infants was my own namesake- Kathleen Gallagher. Being part of a very large Irish family with over seventy cousins at this point, I was not aware of another with the name Kathleen. I also found that my paternal great-great grandmother and grandfather are buried in the family plot. What a treasure of a find! I enjoyed an APPsolutely perfect visit to Calvary and I encourage our readers to do the same!
Written August 12, 2022 by Kathleen Gallagher McKiernan
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Faith, Hope, and Remembrance 