NEIGHBORS: Grave digger offers respect to families

When Kennen Huck puts his backhoe digger in park and begins to break the sod in a rectangle shape of eight feet long, 36 inches wide and 5 feet deep, he tries not to put a face to the person placed inside the casket which will soon to be lowered into the ground.

Its just too tough.

Huck is the grounds manager at St. Marys Cemetery in Bismarck, and, for the past 15 years, he has mowed and trimmed the grass around the 8,600 gravesites and plowed the narrow, winding roads at the 40-acre site overlooking much of the city.

At the time he was hired by the St. Marys Catholic Church parish, Huck was working at a local beverage distributor. But being raised on a farm in the New Salem area, Huck enjoyed working in the outdoors.

Huck said he knew a sister at St. Marys Catholic Church who remembered he liked to work outdoors. When she knew of the job opening at the cemetery, she recommended him to Deacon Rex McDowell, the cemetery manager.

His work is done behind the scenes, typically a day or two before the burial.

Using a bucket designed for the dimensions of a grave and with unique shaped claws to puncture the hardest of soil, Huck can sit in the cab of the backhoe and quickly and efficiently dig a gravesite with walls clean, straight and a precise depth in less than an hour.

Huck also subcontracts with other area cemeteries in the area.

Ive been to cemeteries where there are hundreds or thousands and to family plots where there is one person buried," he said.

When he is not in his backhoe, Huck and a seasonal part-time employee keep the cemetery grounds mowed and trimmed. Huck said it can take up to six days manicuring the plots and maintaining the sprinkler system.

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NEIGHBORS: Grave digger offers respect to families