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There were several ponds on the property. The brothers hauled dirt into the field between St. Peter's and the Gate House in order to eliminate one of several ponds on the property. This was not entirely successful but adequate to use the field to grow vegetables. The problem was finally solved in the mid 1970's by blasting a drainage trench from the field to beyond Marian Hall. Fed by natural springs, another pond with a small island was located on what is now the site of the Lowell Thomas Building. In 1911 it was drained, deepened, and rimmed by a hired mason. Around 1935, it was converted into an outdoor swimming pool. To create a base for the concrete bottom, the brothers pressed old bedsprings vertically into the mud, then added a horizontal layer of bedsprings, and poured the base, mixing the elements by hand. The cemetery was a hasty choice made when the first brother died in September 1909. It was placed in a hollow at the south end of the Bech property. Brother Peter Augustine spent one winter preparing the area and removing the stones. Brother Paul Acyndinus and the novices built the cement wall around the cemetery in 1921. |