Ridge Family Plot: Bronze Plaque Installation and Dedication

We recently celebrated the completion of a special project, involving years of strategizing, planning, and preparation, highlighting the successful partnership on this project with our beloved Sister Community Marble City Activity Organization. Mission accomplished!

On a trip back to the reservation in May 2025, I had gathered stones from the Ridge/Watie Cemetery in Polson, Oklahoma and the Elias Cornelius Boudinot II gravesite in the Worcester Cemetery, Park Hill Mission Cemetery (1839), near Tahlequah. These stones were for our members to keep or place on the Ridge Family graves in Grass Valley during this installation and dedication event. To connect our communities and as a return offering, I had also collected stones locally at the Bear River in Grass Valley to place at the Ridge Family graves we visited in Polson and Tahlequah.

Then, on the morning of Saturday, June 21, 2025, CNCV and our Marble City Activity Organization (MCAO) delegation, Myra Bush Robertson, her husband Junior, Reba Rodgers (Will Chavez’s mother), Missy Flute (Mary Buzzard’s sister-in-law), all came together at the John Rollin Ridge Family Burial Plot in Grass Valley, California. Together, we celebrated and completed the first installation step for the new Bronze Plaque with the CNCV and MCAO logos along with the Cherokee Nation Seal. The plaque was installed on the perimeter curb surrounding the eleven Ridge Family graves. It was a beautiful, cool, and breezy morning beneath the shade of towering cedar trees.

After the installation and a short history presentation, Chairperson Sabrina McKinney closed the dedication by leading us in singing Amazing Grace in Cherokee and offering home-grown tobacco to anyone who wished to leave some at the gravesites as an offering and/or prayer. We then all proceeded to Tofanelli’s Gold Country Bistro in Grass Valley for a pleasant and enjoyable hosted luncheon with our Cherokee families.

Finally, on July 3rd, we traveled back to Grass Valley and completed the final perimeter sealant phase. My cousin Francis, her husband Brian, and their dog Honey wanted to come along with Liz, Jolene, and I.

We thank everyone, here and in Oklahoma, who have supported and helped us through the years on the Ridge Family Plot restoration, maintenance, and identification projects. WADO!!

— Mike Webb, CNCV Culture Center Chair