COLUMBUS, Ohio – Loved ones aren’t the only thing buried in the 122-year-old Lowellville Cemetery in eastern Ohio. Deep underground, locked in ancient shale formations, are lucrative quantities of natural gas.

Whether to drill for that gas is causing soul-searching as cemeteries — including veterans’ final resting places in Colorado and Mississippi — join parks, playgrounds, churches and residential backyards among the ranks of places targeted in the nation’s shale drilling boom.