Tech's Buried History: Burntstand Cemetery

Abstract

Most students and faculty are probably not aware that at the corner of North Dixie Avenue and 12th Street used to lie an abandoned cemetery. In 1966 President Everett Derryberry placed his trusted assistant Leonard Crawford in charge of relocating this cemetery. Moving a cemetery is a difficult task from both a practical and legal standpoint, so Crawford had his work cut out for him. He based his method on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' project to relocate cemeteries that lay within the J. Percy Priest Reservoir. Permissions had to be obtained from both the Tennessee Department of Public Health and the relatives of the deceased to move the bodies, and Crawford made each and every one of the calls to secure those permissions. Finally, Tech went to court and condemned the property so that they could move the bodies who could not be identified, all of which were relocated to Shipley Cemetery.