Geophysical Surveys in the Carver Family Cemetery, George Washington Carver National Monument, Missouri

In August 1999, tests were conducted with three geophysical instruments on a lO-meter square grid in the northeast corner of the Carver family cemetery, George Washington Carver National Monument, Diamond, Missouri. The instruments included a Geoscan FM36 flux gate magnetometer, a Geoscan RM15 soil resistance meter, and a Sensors and Software Noggin 250 ground-penetrating radar unit. The magnetic data revealed patterns very similar to those identified by J. L. Emery as a result of her work in 1981. There are broad similarities between the magnetic and soil resistance data. Neither of these instruments appeared to detect patterns that can be consistently associated with the locations of known graves. Both instruments detected considerable variation in the apparent natural soils that make up the nearsurface portion of the cemetery grounds. The ground-penetrating radar data also reveal a very noisy deposit even though distinct radar reflections correspond with the locations of some of the known graves. Additional ground-penetrating radar work might prove successful at detecting more of the graves thought to be present in the cemetery.