Pleasant Ridge Cemetery
North West of Carmen
Alfalfa County, Oklahoma

If you would like to volunteer to photograph Pleasant Ridge Cemetery, please contact me.

Compiled by Lavona Roush Submitted by Marty Myers

Transcribed & Submitted by Paul & Verla Blackledge

History of Pleasant Ridge Cemetery of Carmen, Oklahoma

The early Pleasant Ridge Cemetery, located two miles north of Carmen, Oklahoma, seemed to have been started by pioneer settlers who lived in the area and had a need for a burial plot. They probably began by using the corner of a then unclaimed quarter of land, or, by the consent of Melvin Swaney (Sweany), a bachelor, who had filed on the land. In mortuary books, Pleasant Ridge was, in the early 1900s, referred to as "Prairie Chapel" and occasionally the "Sweaney" cemetery. In 1898 there were five graves there that we are sure of. The first "recorded" date on a gravestone is 1896 of Clara A. White, daughter of Joseph and Louisa (Thorndyke) White who died at the age of thirteen. A sod schoolhouse, known as the "Humpback", was built diagonally north from the cemetery around 1898-99. A frame school house later replaced it, sometime after 1907. A frame church, Prairie Chapel, was built across the road east in 1903. On the 15th of November, 1900, Mr. Sweany sold the quarter of land to Salathiel Grisamore.

The pleasant Ridge Cemetery of Carmen was organized February 6, 1903 in the County of Woods, Territory of Oklahoma. Trustees and officers were elected and they voted to accept Mr. Grisamore's proposition to deed one acre of land in the northeast corner of Section 27-25-12W for the cemetery. The deed filed in 1905 showed the Pleasant Ridge Cemetery paying Mr. Grisamore $200.00 for a tract of land two acres more or less. During this time by-laws were written, a drive established, and the price of lots set. Lots were sold for $5.00 and increased to $10.00 in 1908. Cards were sent out asking for $1.00 upkeep donations, and this policy continued many years.

In 1908 there were 19 lots purchased in the "First Addition" (which in the books is indicated as "II"), plus the 98 lots in the original section. There were 198 lots platted in the addition. Of this, 13 were set aside for the drive, one for a pump and flag pole, and two for "Potter's Field". Minutes of meetings were kept until 1923; then there is a gap until 1940; and another gap between 1941 and 1962. Either meetings weren't held, or minutes were lost. However a number of dedicated people continued to collect donations and see to the up-keep of the cemetery.

In May 1962, a meeting was held where it was voted that a Perpetual Care Fund be established on a $100.00 a lot basis. Board members approached lot owners and by the following year had collected $3,510.00; in two years $6,000.00. The Perpetual Care Fund continued to grown and the interest from this fund provides the money for fencing, curbing, mowing, dirt hauling, and other maintenance. No other assessments are made, and lots purchased include Perpetual Care. A permanent record book was compiled by Ruth Thorndyke.

Names of early founders include Baldwin, Boyce, White, Belknap, Bales, Hart, Radcliff, Westfall, Roberts, Sellers, Lakey, and Halverson. Those who were most instrumental in establishing the Perpetual Care Fund were Will Oakley, Ruth Thorndyke, Charles Emery, Ed Harvey, and Tony Church.

For the researcher: This cemetery has a permanent record book, which contains burials, stone inscriptions (names and dates), lot owners (past and present), and who paid perpetual care. The latter is almost always a relative, though they may not carry the same name. Also there are often family members of different names buried on the same lot, which is not shown in an alphabetical listing. Early records are scarce: very little mortuary information, sometimes just the name of a lot owner indicating that the family lived near by in early days and moved on. We sometimes know there is a burial there, but no stone or record. Often these were babies. We have a "Potter's Field" and know there are burials there but no records. Any additional information, if there is any, can be found by contacting me, or a future secretary.

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