Black Oak In Grove Oak: Pointing Upwards, And Hearts Up And Down

For several years now, I’ve been visiting the Black Oak Cemetery in Grove Oak, Alabama (I have several, several ancestors from the Christian side of my family buried here — if you’re a Sand Mountain Gilbert or Fossett, we’re very likely related) and am really taken with the more primitive monuments of some of those here:

Tree motif:

 

The upside-down heart motif — which is very interesting, also, the use of ‘bornd’ for the birth year:

John L.A. Brown monument with the beautiful tree and hearts, and the hand pointing upward (occasionally I hear from members of this family since I’ve been posting pics of this monument and cemetery for a while, which is so nice):

This is how the stone appeared in 2005:

and in 2011: