Pleasant Grove Cemetery is adjacent to the Pleasant Grove M.E. Church and is located in Section 6 of Milford Township, Story County, Iowa.
On Jan 23, 1877, the trustees of the newly formed Pleasant Grove M. E. Church purchased the ground adjacent to the church to serve as a cemetery for the church members and neighbors from Thomas R. and Eleanor Hughes for twenty dollars. The ground had been surveyed on June 1, 1874 at the same time as the church lot. They proceeded to sell the first lots of the original 39 lots {containing 7 individual plots) for $2.50 each.
Some of the original owners were Thomas R. Hughes, George Alfred, Wesley Arrasmith, Fritz Randau, Richard Hughes, James B. Swearingen, M. Davis, D. H. Spencer, E N. Kimble, Edgar O. Wilkinson, Thomas J. Sowers, J. M. Bailey, Jacob E. Hoover, William Randau, T. B. Howland, and Isaac Crowder. Three more lots were added in the early 1940’s by using the land that had been set aside as a lane midway thru the cemetery.
The care of the cemetery was passed from the church trustees to the Milford Township Trustee when the church closed during the First World War. Later the Township Trustee handed the responsibility for the cemetery over to an association of descendents, the Pleasant Grove Cemetery Society. The cemetery has been fortunate that some of the generations have stayed nearby to care for the cemetery but it has not been forgotten by those who moved on. The new front fence was made possible with contributions from descendents across the country in 2004.
Some of the gravestones predate the beginning of the cemetery. These stones were moved from private cemeteries on family farms to Pleasant Grove Cemetery. It is unknown if the people represented by these stones were also moved. The gravestones represent varied types of monuments from the early Victorian draped obelisk and marble heart to the modern stones, some including scenes and pictures.