Dave Ruff and Jane Wellehan of Portland decorate their yard each Halloween with tombstones with the names of significant people who have died in the past year on Sunday. This year’s names include Donald Sutherland, Bill Walton and James Earl Jones. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

In October, as Halloween nears, many front yards turn into a graveyard.

One on Craigie Street in Portland has 24 tombstones that bear a closer look.

Names like legendary actor James Earl Jones and William Post, the creator of the Pop Tart, appear on home-made black plywood markers to honor notable people who have departed over the past year.

It’s a project that David Ruff and Jane Wellehan have been at for 20 years now.

“It’s our own strange little hobby,” Wellehan said.

It grew out of a family love for “Harry Potter.” When their daughters were 7 and 9, Ruff made tombstones out of plywood for Lily and James Potter, Harry Potter’s parents, killed when he was a baby.

To fill out the yard a bit, they added some gravestones for real people who had recently departed, like Pope John Paul II.

Celtic’s great Bill Walton is among the names on headstones at Dave Ruff and Jane Wellehan’s home in Portland this Halloween on Sunday. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

“Harry Potter and the pope,” Ruff joked.

Each Halloween they add more gravestones.

This year, Dickey Betts of the Allman brothers, “MASH” and “The Hunger Games” actor Donald Sutherland, singer and actor Kris Kristofferson and center fielder Willie Mays all have tombstones of their own.

The stones pay tribute not only to celebrities and entertainers but also to figures who have meant something to the family or had an impact on society.

For example, there’s one for Maureen Flavin Sweeney, the World War II weather reporter whose predictions of bad weather inspired the Allies to postpone D-Day, changing the course of history and ensuring the Normandy landing was successful. Sweeney died in December at the age of 100.

There’s also Peter Buxtun, who died in May at age 86. An epidemiologist, Buxtun was best known as the whistleblower who told the world about the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, a government project that deceived hundreds of Black men.

It’s about honoring people who have “bent the arc toward justice,” Ruff said.

“People who made a difference for others,” Wellehan added.

Dave Ruff and Jane Wellehan of Portland decorate their yard each Halloween with tombstones with the names of significant people who have died in the past year on Sunday. This year’s names include Willie Mays, Donald Sutherland, Dame Maggie Smith and James Earl Jones. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

Sports legends are also well represented among the graves. The couple had already put up their graveyard when Cleveland Indians and Boston Red Sox pitcher Luis Tiant died in early October, so Ruff went right back to work on an additional grave.

Throughout the year, Ruff and Wellehan make note of important deaths – from the famous to the obscure – and commence the narrowing-down process as Halloween approaches.

Some candidates don’t make it. They started with “50 or 60 names” this year, Ruff said.

“Then we’ll debate, because sometimes (Ruff) will have more sports people, I’ll have more writers, and we go back and forth,” Wellehan added.

One controversial pick this year was O.J. Simpson, whose grave was decorated with a glove, an ode to his murder trial. The family mulled it over but ultimately decided Simpson was too famous not to include in their annual display.

Writers are favorites in the yard, like Alice Munro, a Canadian short story author who died in May. Wellehan and Ruff are English teachers by trade, as well as avid readers. She teaches at Portland High School and he worked at Thornton Academy before founding the Great Schools Partnership, a nonprofit that works to support schools.

Though their daughters have since moved out of the house, they still find ways to be involved in the family tradition. When someone of note dies, the couple can count on a text from the kids.

“The kids will text us: ‘Grave-Worthy,'” Wellehan said.

One grave, topped with the silhouette of a black cat, takes the family tradition full circle by honoring a “Harry Potter” icon.

“Dame Maggie Smith, 1934-2024,” the grave reads in white sharpie. “British actress is known for Violet Crawley and Professor McGonagall. Mischief Managed!”

Former Staff Writer Bonnie Washuk contributed to this story.