Pioneer Cemetery, Woodsfield, Ohio

Pioneer cemetery is located in the heart of Woodsfield a short block west of the Monroe County Courthouse. It is one of the oldest cemeteries in the County having been established about 1812 when Woodsfield became a town. That would have been a couple of years before Monroe became a county. Buchanan Church Cemetery located about 5-miles west of Woodsfield on State Route 78 and Steed Cemetery located about 2-miles south of Woodsfield near the intersection of Ohio State Routes 800 and 26 appear to have been close-contemporaries of the Pioneer Cemetery with the date-of-death of their first residents being 1811 and 1836, respectively.

Oak Lawn Cemetery appears to be a community cemetery with no specific church connection. In the late 1800s, as the Steed and Pioneer cemeteries were becoming full Oak Lawn Cemetery was opened. Oak Lawn is still an active community cemetery for Woodsfield and surrounding areas. Oak Lawn nearly touches the north-west corner of Pioneer.

There are no known original records of Pioneer Cemetery burials. The most comprehensive inventory of graves is a 1985 inventory of tombstone inscriptions made by Norris F. Whitakker and Louise Decker Gadea with assistance from Sheila Stollar and her son Corey. The authors of this inventory estimated that the 643 graves that they found may have been a little over half of the total number of graves in Pioneer Cemetery.

Photographed from atop the Monroe County Courthouse by R.E. Harrington

Last modified 10 July 2012 by reh