The project has managed to seed other gravesite work in the community and in the burial industry. For instance, the wife of Jimmie Crutchfield lay beside him and was also unmarked until the Cemetery donated a marker for Julia Crutchfield. Olivia Taylor, the wife of C.I. Taylor is also on the list for a headstone. Often a headstone, such as the marker for Bill Gatewood[3] was donated by the headstoneengraver, which automatically advances the donated money to the next Negro league baseball player headstone.
Baseball historian Larry Lester works with Dr. Krock and with other researchers of the Society for American Baseball Research, they have compiled a list of about 3,600 players, their birth dates and death dates, where they are buried, and if they have headstones.[5] Much of the research comes from the Negro Leagues Research Committee, an arm of the Society for American Baseball Research.[8]
In 2011, the Josh Gibson[7][15] foundation honored Dr. Krock and the people behind his Grave Marker Project. Gibson himself was buried in an unmarked grave for nearly three decades.
On July 9, 2009 Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart alleged that four workers at Burr Oak Cemetery dug up more than 200 graves, dumped the bodies into unmarked mass graves, and resold the plots in a scheme that went back at least five years.[16]Burr Oak Cemetery has become well known as one of the few cemeteries that has historically focused on the needs of the African American community, it is the final resting place of many black celebrities, including Chicago blues musicians, athletes, and other notables.
Chicago's Cook County Sheriff's Office created a website to give anyone in the world the ability to search 43,555 photos in a database of marked, identified graves at the Burr Oak Cemetery. While it is unknown if any Negro league baseball players' graves were involved in the Burr Oak Cemetery scandal, researchers continue work to determine if this is true.
