Research in the 1990s confirmed that the general ground of the cemetery marking the graves of between 800 and 1000 people was levelled and grassed in the 1950s.
Another 360 plots were created on the same piece of ground.
Geoff Pye, who lived in Oamaru but has since moved to Cromwell, approached the Waitaki District Council last year suggesting that appropriate signs be provided at the cemetery to include names, dates of burials, block and plot numbers and, where available, maps or plans of the old general ground area.
The council had been ''quite receptive'' to the idea and pricing and concepts were being put together for a memorial, he said.
''I'm hoping in the next two or three months that we might know a bit more about it.''
Mr Pye again met the council to discuss plans last Friday and said he would like to see more input into the concept of a memorial.
''I'm a little reluctant to give the OK to something that represents, you could argue, 800 to 1000 people and their families ... it would be good to have a bit more input into it.''
Listing the names and burial plots would not be straightforward, but the lost graves were a part of the town's history.
Mr Pye said he often picked a name of someone whose grave had been destroyed at random to research.
''If I've got a bit of time, I'll go back through the old Papers Past and find the history of that person and what they did - it's quite interesting.''
He has set up an online group called ''Oamaru's `Lost' Graves'' to gather information and assist family researchers to better understand what happened and initial support had been good.
The Oamaru Old Cemetery was divided into blocks according to religious affiliation.
General ground, where the graves were destroyed, was known as the ''pauper's ground'' and was hilly and rough.
It was set aside for those who, for whatever reason, were not buried in blocks with various religious affiliations.
A memorial book was prepared by the Waitaki District Council in 2000, naming and detailing all of those whose burial sites between blocks 101 and 116 were disturbed.
It is now on the council website, following a request from Mr Pye.
