Management plan

Descendants and Friends of the

Historic Bush River Quaker Cemetery

Newberry, South Carolina

June 2009

The Bush River Quaker Cemetery in Newberry SC is the property of the North Carolina Yearly Meeting [NCYM] of Friends, Greensboro, North Carolina. The contact information for the NCYM is listed at the end of this report.

Since 2002 a group of Bush River Cemetery descendants and other Quaker researchers, with the permission and support of the NCYM, has worked toward the goal of having the Cemetery accessible to visitors every day of the year. In 2002, a group of about 50 volunteer workers were recruited to travel to Newberry to clean up the Cemetery. Since that time, our group has raised money through donations to contract for professional maintenance.

As volunteers, it is our hope to establish an ethical basis for all stabilization and preservation work undertaken for the Bush River Cemetery, whether we do the work ourselves or have it done by professionals. We will follow a plan which was adapted from the ethics section of Essentials for Cemetery Monument Care created by the National Center for Preservation Technology and Training and then incorporated into a management plan of the Old Athens/Jackson Street Cemetery, Athens, Georgia. We ask everyone who visits or works in the cemetery to follow these guidelines:

• Do no harm
• Respect and retain the historic fabric and original material
• Minimize our impacts at the Cemetery
• Understand and document chemicals, products, and maintenance processes used
• Be authentic
• Identify repairs
• Document all activities
• Maintain and protect the resource

Manmade and natural threats to the cemetery include the list below. We hope to have a positive impact, especially in controlling and dealing with the effects of manmade dangers:

• Air pollution
• Corrosion
• Decay
• Deterioration/Weathering
• Erosion - both wind and water
• Inappropriate maintenance and management practices
• Inappropriate treatments and repairs
• Inability to secure the site
• Invasive vegetation
• Litter
• Natural disasters and emergencies
• Vandalism and theft

From 2006 until the present, all cemetery maintenance has been performed by Newberry Lawn Care, owner James Folk. The Cemetery is maintained during the months from March through November. In addition, each spring the cemetery is throughly cleaned of winter debris. Each month the Newberry Lawn Care performs the following tasks by hand. No vehicles enter the cemetery:

• litter pick up
• dead limbs and branches pickup
• trim of weeds, being especially careful that equipment such as weed eaters does not touch or damage the tombstones
• cut stumps

Additionally, we have asked Newberry Lawn to identify and report to Judith Russell or Ann Crowley:

• theft of tombstones, benches, or signage outside the Cemetery
• vandalism
• breakage
• any effects of natural disasters

We have not used

• fire ant control
• chemical weed or vegetation control

Contact Info:

North Carolina Yearly Meeting of Friends

NCYM Administrative Office 4811 Hilltop Road Greensboro, NC 27407 Phone: 336-292-6957 800-371-8896

NCYM Cemetery Committee John Allen, Chair @bellsouth.net

Friends and Descendants of Bush River Quaker Cemetery

Judith Russell Bogart, GA 30622 jrussell2@charter.net

Ann Crowley Athens, GA 30606 ann.crowley@charter.net

Cemetery Maintenance

Newberry Lawn Care James Folk 108 Mendenhall Road Newberry SC 29108

Emergency Contact