There’s a fellow in Brenham who says he’ll travel as far as he needs to and go as far as he wants to, to repair damaged gravestones. Especially older ones, because he thinks they tell great stories in a lot of cases.
He’s recently retired school teacher Lowell Herzog, who, after 21 years in the classroom and three years of specialized training, now refers to himself as a Gravestone Conservationist.
Herzog tells Navasota News a lot of people say “repair,” although you can’t really do that. But he will certainly “restore,” them. And he says he’s recently received permission from the City of Navasota to conserve gravestones here in Oakland Cemetery without the need for permitting.
He says he does a lot of cleanings, and they range from $15 to $20 for a small child’s stone, to probably $150 if it’s a large, say 10- or 12-foot marker, or something like that.
Now dealing with larger repairs or resetting a stone that’s loose at the base and is leaning or has been turned-over, on the other hand, he estimates can cost from a hundred to a thousand dollars or more.
For more information, check out his website, texasgravestoneconservation dot com, or you can call him at 979-836-7715.
