"The Lady in Granite is located in Lakeview Cemetary in Penn Yan, New York. This is the gravestone for the Gillette family and the ghost is believed to be that of Matilda Gillette. The image of her reclining head appeared on the dark grave and nothing has been able to remove it, even repeated polishing of the stone. Legend has it that over time her whole image will be formed and she will be free to haunt the local community."
"The story I heard as a child was that the Gillettes were a happily married couple who made a promise to each other that when one of them died the other would remain unmarried. When Matilda Gillette passed away, Francis Gillette did remarry and as a result of breaking his promise, he found that his wife's face appeared on the tombstone. His was horrified by this image and being unsuccessful in trying to remove the image by polishing the stone, he ordered a new tombstone to replace the original one. Matilda's face appeared again on the new tombstone."
"I did asked some local historians about this legend and they felt that there are no facts to support the validity of the stories that have been told about the Gillettes. There is no documentation that the stone was ever replaced. When we visited the grave to take pictures, my children and I also noticed that the side graves indicate that Francis Gillette died seven years earlier than Matilda Gillette. That does put a bit of a damper on this story. Even so, the image is real and myths that form in a young child's mind can be compelling."
This is taken from: http://incenseandspices.com/gillette.htm
Here are some pictures that I took at the cemetary! The first is the front of the Gillette family stone...
