By: Keith Kappes
Columnist
Carter County Times
Please pardon my grandfatherly pride as I relate the story of how the cooperation of a state agency with my family led to the rescue of one of Rowan County’s most historic family cemeteries.
Seamands Cemetery was established in March 1856 with the burial of Barnett Seamands, owner of a farm on what is now U. S. 60 east of Morehead. Later, most of the farmland became SunnyBrook Golf Course.
The nine-hole course was built and operated originally by Ernest and Becky Patton who later sold it to Morehead State University. In 2006, MSU closed the course and eventually declared the land as surplus property.
The state transferred the property to the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources (KDFWR) for it to be converted to a wildlife management area. Today, it is designated as SunnyBrook WMA, consisting of 143 acres.
When the cemetery was started, it was located in Fleming County. Two months later, it became part of Rowan County, along with a piece of Morgan County, when Rowan County was established by the General Assembly.
Seamands Cemetery contains the graves of eight family members, four adults and four children.
The uncovering of the cemetery from 15 years of unchecked growth of trees, grassland and weeds was the result of a church project last spring to help identify cemeteries for BillionGraves.com, a genealogy website.
With the approval of the KDFWR, Brody Barnett of Morehead, a student at Rowan Middle School, and two of his uncles, Kenley and Kory Kappes, cleared away the overgrown vegetation, straightened the badly weathered headstones and repaired the wooden fence surrounding the tiny graveyard.
Brody’s grandparents, Keith and Janet Kappes, purchased a new cemetery sign which is being installed. Photographs of the headstones and the GPS location of the cemetery now appear in the BillionGraves.com database.
“We didn’t want the cemetery and that family’s graves to be lost to history,” said Brody, the son of Kris and Kally Barnett, and a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Keith Kappes can be reached at keithkappes@gmail.com
