JAMESTOWN (AP) - The more than 2,000 graves at North Dakota's state mental hospital here are marked with the names of the deceased.

That's contrary to many state mental institutions across the country that buried their dead anonymously.

Jim Davis, a reference specialist for the state Historical Society, said he knows of no widespread anonymous burial practice in North Dakota. Probably because North Dakota is such a small state, he said, "the family was more involved."

George Barron, a retired teacher and genealogy buff in Jamestown, said the 2,200 or so graves at the State Hospital are located at two cemeteries.

Documents containing the names of the buried are kept at the hospital, he said.

"The death records are fairly accurate," he said. "Everybody who was ever there can be identified."

The Hospital for the Insane opened at Jamestown in 1885. It was later renamed the State Hospital.

State Hospital officials did not return telephone calls seeking comment.

The first cemetery at the State Hospital, when it was known mostly as the "state insane asylum," was used from 1885 to 1895, Barron said. The second cemetery continues to be used, he said.

"Many of the early markers were made at the hospital," Barron said. Most of the names on the grave markers are misspelled, or "were shortened to fit on the stones," made either from concrete or granite, he said. Some of the older markers are 6 feet tall, he said.

"They're all marked but almost all except in recent times have goofy spellings," Barron said. "They didn't know how to spell - but they're close enough to figure out who they are."

Many of those who died at the facility are not buried there, Barron said.

"Their relatives did not want them buried at the State Hospital," he said.