Beaver County resident wants to fix destroyed monument in Cranberry Township
Pinewood Memorial Gardens in Cranberry Township is one of 19 cemeteries across Butler County hosting a Wreaths Across America ceremony Saturday, Dec. 13, which has been designated as “Wreaths Across America Day” since 2008.
However, for nearly two years, the cemetery’s veterans section has shown visible damage from a vehicle crash, and a Beaver County resident is trying to have the issue resolved.
“It's a disgrace to our veterans,” said Tracey Hughes, of Darlington. “So many of them are in that cemetery.”
For at least 10 months, Hughes has made it her goal to have Pinewood Gardens replace a missing marble stone in a part of the cemetery where veterans are buried.
The stone was part of a set of five until it was broken in a vehicle accident. When they were originally put in place, each of the five marble bases was connected to a flagpole and placed adjacent to one of the five points of a star-shaped stone.
“Probably about two years ago, I want to say, a drunk driver hit one of the big marble bases,” Hughes said. “The marble bases hold veterans' names and have flags on them.”
Hughes said the name of her brother, Richard W. Hughes, was on the stone that was destroyed. It was placed there in either 1979 or 1980. Hughes said a number of her family members are laid to rest at Pinewood Gardens.
“I'm doing this because I have family members out there,” Hughes said. “I have probably 10 or 15 family members out there, and out of them, I have eight veterans.”
Michele Stone, of EverStory Partners, the Florida-based company that manages Pinewood Gardens, said the incident occurred in March 2024.
Hughes says she first pressed the issue with Pinewood Gardens’ general manager. The time frame of this meeting is disputed. Hughes says it happened in March this year, while Stone says it took place at “the end of 2024.”
“They told me that because of funding, they were doing things through the insurance company,” Hughes said. “Then they said that they couldn't get the marble matched.”
“Our general manager spoke with her at the end of 2024 and said that we were aware of the damage,” Stone said.
Hughes says she made further appeals to staff at EverStory Partners, which went nowhere.
“I wrote the CEO an email and have not heard anything back from them,” Hughes said. “I stopped out at the Pinewood office about a month ago. Nothing has been done.”
Speaking on behalf of EverStory, Stone said insurance has nothing to do with the delay in replacing the marble base.
“We're not waiting on insurance for this,” Stone said. “It's something that we're taking care of ourselves.”
She said EverStory intends to replace the stone, but the company is prioritizing other projects at this time.
“This is part of our plan to restore the park. We have a prioritized list of things that need to be done, and this is on that list,” Stone said. “We just haven't made it to that part yet. There'll be other projects that we'll be doing before this one, but it is absolutely on the list of things to do.”
Hughes says she has given up on the idea of having the stone replaced by this year’s Wreaths Across America ceremony, but is hoping that the issue can be resolved by this time in 2026.
“It’s already been two years since that piece has been missing,” she said.
