A Visit to Washington Cemetery in Brooklyn

I haven't posted any genealogy blogs here before, but I'm thinking that this might be a decent place to lay out some of my research. I'm starting to write about this in the middle of an already developed hobby. I started to doing original genealogical research during the first COVID lockdown. I had just graduated high and was looking for something to do over the summer. Of course I didn't start knowing nothing, my family has many researchers that have come before me and a significant amount of work from which I have built my minor contributions.

Today I visited the Washington Cemetery in Brooklyn. I'm living in the New York area at the moment and it wasn't too hard to access using the Subway. I visited the cemetery because I knew that I had family buried there, specifically my mother's grandparents and great-grandparents. I didn't have too much difficulty navigating the cemetery since my father had taken down notes for how to find the graves when we buried by great-grandmother there in 2006. I was certainly a little one back then, but I remember traveling all the way out to Brooklyn to attend the funeral. 

Using my father's directions, I was able to locate the specific plot. Much to my delight I saw that the plot had a big stone gate labeled as the "Independent Novoredoker Association." This branch of my family had immigrated from Novoredok (Navahrudak) which is in modern day Belarus. They were active in the social organization or Verein of Jewish immigrants from that city. 

This is the picture that I took of the gate. There was a lot of thick grass growing wildly behind the gate.

I was able to find grave of my great-grandparents. Unfortunately I couldn't get a good picture of their gravestone, because there was so much grass growing around it. That's not really problem because I already knew all the details that would be on their gravestone. Farther back in the plot I found other ancestors and relatives of mine. 

There were the graves of my great-grandfather's parents Jonah and Sarah Levine, and my great-grandfather's older brother Morris and his wife Anna. 

פ"נ
איש תם וישר, וירא אלהים
הקדיש עתים לתורה ולעבודה
ר' יונה ב'ר משה לייב הליו
נפטר ב' אב תשי"ד
ת נ צ ב"ה
Jonah
Levine
Died Aug. 1, 1954
Age 79 Years
Beloved Husband
Devoted Father
And Grandfather

(Translation of Hebrew: Here lies a simple and straight man, who feared God, and designated time for Torah study and prayer, Yonah son of Moshe Leib haLevi. He passed away 2 Av 5714. M[ay] H[is soul] B[e bound] I[n the bond of] L[ife].) 

פ"נ
האשה החשובה והצנועה
יראת אלקים וחוננת דלים
שרה רבקה בת ר' יעקב
נפטרה ח' אלול תשי"א
ת נ צ ב"ה
Sarah Rivka
Levine
Died Sept. 9, 1951
Age 75 Years
Beloved Wife
Devoted Mother
And Grandmother

(Translation of Hebrew: Here lies the important and modest woman, a fearer of God and gracious to the poor, Sarah Rivka daughter of Yaakov, she passed away 8 Elul 5711. M[ay] H[er soul] B[e bound] I[n the bond of] L[ife].) 

Here is a map with a flag of approximately where in the cemetery the above graves are located: