At a heated Tuesday night meeting, the Crown Hill Cemetery District Board reaffirmed that it does not plan to allow a run and walk on cemetery grounds this fall.

A motion to allow the Jim Beavers Memorial Graveyard Gallop to continue for a second year failed at the board’s meeting, with only one trustee in support. Tuesday’s debate over the event quickly escalated, with raised voices, language, tears and conflict within the board.

The race was organized by the Homesteader Museum last year as a way to honor Beavers, a longtime member of both the cemetery and museum boards. It drew 85 participants.

But cemetery trustees reported receiving some complaints about the event and they voted in January against hosting the event again. However, due to a mix-up, members of the Beavers’ family and the Homesteader Museum Association Board were unaware of the cancellation until May, when they began planning the 2023 event. 

The issue was revisited in June without a vote and multiple members of Beavers’ family and the Homesteader Museum board attended Tuesday’s meeting to ask the cemetery board to reconsider.

Honoring Jim Beavers

Last year’s Graveyard Gallop took place Oct. 29, a day before the one-year anniversary of Jim Beavers’ death. Participants could run or walk a 10K, 5K or a mile inside and near the cemetery grounds. The 5K and 10K events started and ended in the cemetery but mainly occurred on Lane 9, while the 1 mile walk was around the perimeter path inside the cemetery,  said Michela Morrissey, the Homesteader’s registrar and collections manager.

Participants were encouraged to either dress up in costume or wear the run’s official shirts. All proceeds went to the Homesteader Museum Association to fund scholarships so children could attend workshops at the museum as well as educational and professional training. Last year’s race raised roughly $1,500, Morrissey said.

“It is a family event and allows families the opportunity to miss their loved ones buried in the cemetery with a more positive spin rather than it being somber,” Barb Beavers, Jim’s widow, said to begin Tuesday’s discussion. “It’s a positive association with the cemetery, especially for children.”

Community complaints and board concerns

Feedback was positive immediately following the run.

“We did talk about it and we said that it was OK and that it would be OK in the future,” said Rachel Bidon, the Crown Hill Cemetery District’s clerk. “But then we had some complaints and in January we decided not to do it ...”

Bidon left a message for the museum in January but the museum was closed for cleaning that month, and Morrissey was out of the state. 

Trustee Clarence Anderson, who is the board’s longest-serving member, said the board had not been consulted ahead of last year’s event and that several community members complained afterwards.

“They just don’t feel it’s right. Like you, and the rest of you, they got family out here,” Anderson told Barb Beavers and other supporters of the event at Tuesday’s meeting.

Bidon added that the complainants, who were not identified, feel the cemetery is a sacred place.

Trustee Bill Metzler said two or three complaints had been received by the board; trustee Monte McClain said four families approached him with complaints.

Trustee Syd Thompson, who attended the meeting by phone, said he posed the scenario to community members without mentioning Jim Beavers and the reaction was negative. It was viewed “almost like interrupting a church service,” he said.

Board Chairman John Karst noted the cemetery is funded by taxpayers and said many may not like the event.

There are over 6,000 graves in the cemetery that the board is responsible for, Anderson said, and he heard the complaint “that people are going to sell their lots if this continues.”

Anderson also voiced concerns about the board’s inability to turn down other events if it allowed the Graveyard Gallop, mentioning Satanists and events that occur in other parts of the country.

“[On] Halloween we have a lot of weird people running around naked in the streets,” Anderson said.

Other concerns included this year’s logo for the run, which involved a skull, liability insurance and the incorrect perception that the cemetery board made money from the event. Members of the museum board including Barb Beavers and Julie Sheets offered to compromise on issues raised by the board.

The cemetery is a community space

Barb Beavers said the event honored her late husband, and thought the longtime member of the two boards would like to see the race continue.

She noted that she checked for funerals on the day of the race.

“I mean, I would have been horrified during my boys’ and Jim’s [funerals],” Barb Beavers said. “If there had been an event going on, we would not have done that.”

She also looked for people visiting graves and was prepared to explain the event, but didn’t see any visitors. However, she said race participants did visit family members’ graves, as well as Jim’s, for the first time.

Beavers also said the cemetery has allowed educational tours for children on the grounds. During one of these tours, a bus drove onto the grass. She said no similar damage was caused by the Graveyard Gallop. 

Morrissey said there are graveyard walk/runs in other towns, including her hometown in Connecticut.

“Our cemetery holds all kinds of events, not just runs: family reunions, school tours for children, people are married in graveyards if that’s their thing,” Morrissey said. “I see it as a community space, we want to bring the community together and get two county affiliated organizations working together to honor a member of both boards.”

Close the gates?

Metzler supported continuing the event, saying he personally had received no complaints. 

“We have other tours going on out here. So if we’re gonna say no to this we might as well say no to everybody then we might as well just lock the gates,” Metzler said.

He later proposed a motion to allow the Graveyard Gallop this year and review it yearly, as well as formulating a policy that makes it clear an event must be postponed or canceled if it conflicts with cemetery policies.

Before Metzler made his motion, he was notified that Thompson was trying to speak.

“My thought is if you’re going to give input at the meeting, you need to be at the table,” Metzler told Thompson. “You can’t vote by call.”

Thompson ended his phone call after Metzler’s comment. Boards in Wyoming generally allow members to participate and vote over the phone. 

Metzler’s motion was not seconded, effectively killing the effort to allow the event this year.

Metzler then left the meeting and without him, Thompson and board member Bill Keller, the six-member board lacked a quorum to conduct its business.

McClain and the rest of the cemetery board encouraged community members to share their comments on the Jim Beavers Memorial Graveyard Gallop. The cemetery can be reached by email at cemeteryoffice01@gmail.com or by phone at 307-754-5220.