DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll carry it the rest of the way for you. Out on the south Texas plain, before McAllen was McAllen, somebody dug a grave. That's how old La Piedad Cemetery is — older than the city that eventually grew up around it.
The marker says this burial ground likely began as a small ranch cemetery in the 1800s, quiet and unhurried, the way ranch life tends to be. And then 1895 rolls around, and the earliest known burial we have a name for is Gertrudis Cavazos. Hold onto that name.
In a place full of stones and silence, she's the one the record reaches back to first. Most of the property, over the years, was deeded by the Arnold family. Other portions came from the City of McAllen itself.
So the ground beneath these graves has more than one story in its deed history alone. Walk through La Piedad today and you're reading a whole library in stone. There's religious iconography.
Masonic grave markers. Woodmen of the World markers. And scattered among them, veterans — men who served in military conflicts going all the way back to World War I, and some who served in foreign armies besides.
Different uniforms, different flags, same patch of South Texas earth holding them now. Somebody had to tend all that, and somebody did. The Asociacion del Cementario La Piedad incorporated in 1930, though the marker is careful to note they organized even earlier than that.
That's the kind of community that doesn't wait on paperwork to do what needs doing. And here's the thing about La Piedad — it hasn't stopped. It still serves the residents of McAllen.
The oldest known grave reaches back to 1895, and the cemetery is still open for business, if you'll pardon the expression. Some places in Texas hold history. La Piedad is still making it.
What the marker says
This burial ground, which predates McAllen, likely began as a small ranch cemetery in the 1800s. The earliest known burial here, in 1895, is of Gertrudis Cavazos. Most of the property was deeded by the Arnold family; other portions were acquired from the City of McAllen. Those interred here include veterans of military conflicts dating to World War I and veterans of foreign armies. The cemetery features religious iconography, Masonic grave markers and Woodmen of the World markers. The burial ground is cared for by the Asociacion del Cementario La Piedad, which incorporated in 1930, but organized earlier. Today, La Piedad Cemetery continues to serve the residents of McAllen. Historic Texas Cemetery - 2005