Students dedicate new gateway for historic State School cemetery

MEREDITH — Rhael LaForest on Saturday sat in a chair next to his best friend and caretaker Bill Stumpf watching as the new gateway and sign at the Chemung Cemetery were dedicated to the memory of residents of the former Laconia State School who are buried there.

LaForest lived in the former institution from 1945 until 1975 but, thanks in large part to Stumpf, now lives independently in Nashua, said he wanted to be there for the official dedication of the additions made by the students of Cocheco Arts and Technology Academy — a Seacoast-based charter school.

"Most of my friends are here," he said wistfully as he looked at the plaques that now mark the graves of those who died during their stay in Laconia. "I feel good now that they have a cemetery where they can rest."

According to Gordon Dubois, the filmmaker who chronicled the former state school in his documentary "Lost in Laconia," the cemetery at Chemung has taken on new meaning in the past few years and with the new gate at the entrance and a mosaic sign installed in front, his life's work of bringing knowledge and respectability to the former residents of the notorious institution is reaching fruition.

Opened in early 1900s as the New Hampshire School for the Feeble Minded and closed in 1991 in the wake of a lawsuit filed by the parents of many of the residents, Dubois was a counselor and along with Superintendent Richard Crocker was one of the employees who forever bolted the doors on the Laconia State School.

He said the cemetery was founded in 1941 and initially consisted of unmarked graves whose wooden markers with numbers would be removed for mowing, stacked in a corner, and replaced haphazardly once the mowing was over.

Dubois said the general attitude was "what difference does it make. No one knows who they were anyway."

The difference was made in 1978 when the Parents Association was formed and a search was made for the records of who was buried where. A longtime caretaker had kept records and Dubois said the plaques that now identify each grave with a name are reasonably accurate.

For Cocheco Arts and Technology Academy Headmistress Christy Cloutier Holmes, the chance for her students to use their artistic talents at Chemung came from Dr. Candace Cole McCrae — a lifelong advocate of the disabled and disenfranchised.

She said the year-long project that resulted in the gateway, the mosaic sign, a flute solo and poetry, taught her students to use their arts and technology gifts for the betterment of others. She said the project also used a key piece of New Hampshire history as its backdrop.

"We are the first state to close a state school and the first one to commemorate the cemetery," she said.

To the students, Cole-McRea said, "Please know that you wil be cherished for what you have done."

She wanted them to know their Chemung project was more than a community project. "You have healed the pain of many. You have said that these people matter," she said.

CAPTION: Rhael LaForest (seated) and his best friend and caretaker wait for the unveiling of the Chemung Cemetery sign that was built and designed by high school students from the Cocheco Arts and Technology Academy. LaForest lived at the former Laconia State School for 25 years. (Laconia Daily Sun photo/Gail Ober)

CAPTION: A mosaic sign — designed such that many disparate elements can create a whole — is unveiled in a ceremony Saturday morning at the Chemung Cemetery. Long neglected, the cemetery is the final resting place for many residents of the now-closed Laconia State School. The sign was part of a year-long art and history project by the students from the Cocheco Arts and Technology Academy. (Laconia Daily Sun photo/Gail Ober)