A little detective work

Echelberger gets permission from township officials before working on any restoration.

“Most are maintained, to a certain level, by the townships,” he said. “Once I am involved, I ask them not to mow near the stones, which is appreciated, since hitting a broken gravestone is hard on the mower.”

He also has taken on a project at the Bellville Cemetery, restoring the gravestones of the town’s founders.

“We were thrilled that Mr. Echelberger was willing to take on this project,” Bellville Mayor Teri Brenkus said. “Before he started, you couldn’t read the lettering on the stones of Bellville founder Robert and his wife, Mary Bell. He cleaned the stones so we can read them, and fixed the stone of Mary Bell that had broken in half.”

Echelberger started at the Pine Run Cemetery, the biggest restoration project he has taken on, this summer.

“It covers over a quarter of an acre and has over 100 graves, though many are either buried or gone,” Echelberger said. For weeks, he cleared bushes and trees near the edges of the cemetery, where he found more graves.

Word of his work has gotten around. He recently was contacted by the Richland County sheriff, who had found a gravestone in a ditch near Mansfield.

“I looked at the stone, and matched it with burial records, determining it was taken from the Hyde Cemetery in Hanover Township, Ashland County,” Echelberger said. “I matched the stone with its original location. We have no idea how it got to Mansfield.”

He also took on the challenge of determining the location of five stones that were found by the Richland County Highway Department.

“I’ve located sites for four of them, and returned them to their proper place,” he said. “The fifth remains a mystery.”

For now, Echelberger is spending most of his time at the Pine Run Cemetery. Asked by one of his neighbors when he hopes to finish that work, Echelberger said, “If I do it all, it will be sometime in 2023.”