One difference I just noticed between Oklahoma and Massachusetts is that there are a lot more cemeteries here! Which only means New England has the tendency to memorialize their dead a bit more responsibly. I'll tell you a little story.
I grew up on 17 acres in a hollow in northeast Oklahoma; it was a really pretty place until the turnpike came through. I was always told there was an old family cemetery in the field out front, and you could easily find some sunken spots in the ground where it was said to be.
One day when I was like 10, I was digging in this old pile of brush and old tree stumps and found a the top half of a tombstone that was broken off at the base. The name on the tombstone was Susan L. Ross, and she was born in 1793 and died in 1845, so there's a very good chance she ended up in Oklahoma via the Trail of Tears. None of my family who lived there knew who she was.
There were several more indentations in the dirt near spot where the cemetery was supposed to be, but I never found any corresponding tombstones. I need to figure out who they are someday.
161 years after she died I am thinking about Susan L. Ross because I found her tombstone in a pile of brush when I was a boy.
