Tuesday, April 13, 1999
Y2K poses monumental problem for cemeteries
Grave concerns for headstones with '19-blank'
BY EARNEST WINSTON
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Here's a Y2K problem that has nothing to do with computers and unlike digital wisps, it's carved in stone. The problem is tombstones bought and engraved while the person they are intended to memorialize is still alive.
If the date of death is after 1999, stones with blank spaces after 19 will have to be recut, refilled or replaced.
In the monument business, advance orders are called preneed purchases. As the new century approaches, that cost-saving idea may turn out to be an unfortunate and expensive mistake.
Up until the mid-1960s, “it was common to put the "19' on the monuments and memorials,” said Bob Fells of the International Cemetery and Funeral Association, an industry group that represents 5,500 members.
“Who are we to assume how long anyone is going to live?” said Don Carpenter Jr., a memorialist with Carpenter Monuments in Hamilton. As early as two decades ago, Mr. Carpenter foresaw the 2000 problem. He persuaded his family, in the mid-1970s, to stop etching “19” and two blank spaces in the date of death space on monuments.
Industry officials don't see carved gravestones as a big problem, just a concern. “Cemetery and monument dealers need to be prepared to assist customers facing the problem,” warned an article in the Reston, Va., group's November magazine.
A random check of gravestones in Winton Place's Spring Grove Cemetery turned up dozens of 19-blanks among its more than 200,000 memorials.
Scott Lewin, an engraver with Lewin Monuments in Fort Mitchell, estimated that one in 25 monuments he has carved has the 19-blanks. He said his grandfather, who founded the company, “used to do it all the time. It was supposed to be cost-effective.”
Nationally, the number of 19-blank gravestones is esti mated at 250,000, but “the really simple truth is you don't know,” said Jeanne Dwyer, manager of programs and administration for Monument Builders of North America, a Des Plaines, Ill., industry group that represents 750 members.
Erasing the carved-in-stone problem won't be easy and it can be costly. Paying for a solution can rise from $100 to several thousands of dollars, Mr. Lewin said, “and there is no good way to fix it.”
There is also the question of who will pay for the repair — the consumer or the company. Is it the consumer who paid for a complete package long ago or the company that sold it?
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