Claremont
Claremont is seeking about $10,000 in donations to rebuild the stone pillars at the Main Street entrance of the city-owned Mountain View Cemetery so it can reinstall iron gates that were donated by William Moody nearly 100 years ago and recently refurbished.
Norma Limoges with the Department of Public Works is coordinating the effort, and it was Limoges who initiated the project in 2014, not long after she spotted the gates partially buried in the snow at the DPW yard.
They had been left there by city employees after a truck hit the cemetery entrance 20 years ago. The truck tore the gates off the pillars, which also were heavily damaged.
“I knew right away what they were,” Limoges said. “So I kept an eye on them. This is our history.”
After the gates were removed following the accident, makeshift stone pillars were later erected so the city could close off the entrance during the spring thaw.
Limoges began seeking grants in 2014 and received donations from the Claremont Savings Bank, Bank of New Hampshire and the Odd Fellows Lodge in Claremont.
Roughly $4,000 was raised and the gates were restored by 3-D Welding Company in Claremont. The refurbishing included some re-welding, sandblasting and painting. Affixed to the gate are small plates bearing the name of the manufacturer and the year. They are back at DPW yard on North Street waiting to be installed.
“In an effort to restore some of Claremont’s history, we are embarking on a campaign to seek donations for the Mountain View Cemetery pillars,” the city said in a news release.
Moody, who is best known for donating about 250 acres in 1916 for the park on Maple Avenue that bears his name, donated five sets of gates. Another pair is at the Mulberry Street entrance to the West Pleasant Street Cemetery, which is also city owned, and two more sets are at St. Mary Cemetery in West Claremont. Limoges said she is not sure what happened to the fifth set. The gates at Mountain View include “walk” gates for pedestrians on either side of the main gates.
The gates were made in the early 1920s by The Stewart Iron Works in Cincinnati and arrived in Claremont by train via New York City.
Weighing several hundred pounds each they were described as “handsome ornamental iron gates,” in a newspaper story in April 1923. They measure 12 feet wide, 9 feet high in the center, and 7 foot 3 inches at the hinges.
“The new gates will add the final touch to extensive improvements that have recently been made at the Main Street entrance of Mt. View Cemetery,” the newspaper article said.
The first burial at Mt. View was in 1888. It contains the graves of several well-known Claremont residents including inventor Albert Ball, a founder of the Sullivan Machine Company; Hosea Parker, U.S. House of Representatives; and Russell Jarvis, who played a part in introducing Merino sheep to the United States.
If more money is raised than is needed, the city said it will put the remainder toward repairing the gates and pillars at the West Pleasant Street Cemetery, Limoges said.
The project has taken longer and cost more than Limoges initially thought it would but she said it has been well worth the effort. Otherwise, the gates would have been likely lost forever.
“I knew they would end up being sold scrap at so much a pound,” Limoges said. “You could never recreate these today. It would be cost prohibitive.
“And it is respect for Mr. Moody, who did so much for the community and we can’t even keep it up,” she added.
Donations can be made out to: City of Claremont — Gate Restoration Project and mailed to City of Claremont, Finance Director, 58 Opera House Square, Claremont, N.H. 03743.
Patrick O’Grady can be reached at pogclmt@gmail.com
