52 Ancestors Week 22: At the Cemetery

 From Amy Johnson Crow: Week 22

The theme for Week 22 is "At the Cemetery." Cemeteries are some of the most special places to a family historian. Whose grave have you particularly wanted to find? What neat tombstones have you found?

I ain't afraid of no ghosts!

    The last time I wrote about this topic was back in late May 2021. I ended that blog wondering if my 2nd great-grandmother Caterina Coppola's siblings were buried in Haverhill's Saint Patrick's Cemetery because at that point I had no clue if they were. Past Chris, you were so naive. Long story short I did find Paolo and Concetta's graves there and now they have profiles on Find a Grave along with their cousin, Giovanni. At the time of my posting, I had no clue just how many Coppolas were at Saint Patrick's until I did a cemetery run with my dad's cousin, Bob. As it turned out many of them were the children of Paolo!

Thanks go out to Rob Williams
at Find a Grave!

    Detective Paolo Coppola's grave took a little while for me to find to be honest because of just how many Coppolas were interred at the cemetery. Saint Patrick's is set up in such a way that people who passed away in a certain decade would be near each other. For example, if someone passed away in 1985. the person would be near people who also passed away in the 1980s unless they were interred with someone else as in the case of my grandfather who was buried with his parents. 

    Since Paolo passed away in the 1950s, I naturally tried to find him in the 1950s area of the cemetery. Along the way, Bob told me stories of some of his friends who passed away (much later than the 1950s!!) and I still had trouble locating him. So, I did what any sensible person would have done. I eventually emailed the cemetery association and asked them to help me locate Paolo. They complied and it turned out that he was buried not too far from my grandparents' final resting place. Actually, he was oddly closer to where my great-grandparents, Giuseppe Carrabs and Clementina Forgione were buried than anything else. I posted his exact location on Find a Grave with the intention of eventually going there myself and a nice user there was kind enough to take a picture before I had a chance to visit the final resting spot. Huh. Talk about "First come, first serve".

       The first thing I noticed about the picture was the wreath. This was in early December and the wreath meant that someone in the family still tended the gravesite. That actually made me feel good, you know. It's unfortunate when graves go untended. But, it's a sad fact of life when the people maintaining the stones are eventually unable to care for them. It happens. At least volunteers will always be on hand to take care of everything! And don't worry. Rob Williams did take a pic of the back of the stone. Paolo is interred with his second wife, Antonia and a granddaughter who unfortunately died young.

    To date I've found nine of his children at St. Patrick's out of fifteen! That's a lot of kids! Keep in mind that he had two wives and a few of the offspring unfortunately died very young. I had thought I found everyone until I went on a cemetery run in April with Bob.

    I had just put in my requests at Haverhill city hall regarding Giovanni and a few other people and we thought it'd be a good idea to visit the cemetery on the way to Walnut Cemetery. More on that adventure in a bit. We were walking around and since it was late fall/early winter we were literally burning daylight because the sun was close to setting. I looked at my watch and I was about to call it quits when I saw this stone.

    "Cheney?", I thought to myself. That name sounded familiar to me. Sure it was a common last name and everything but something else dawned on me. I was missing a couple Coppolas and one of them married a Cheney. Her name was Mary Rose and I rushed to the back to see if it was her.

    BINGO! It was definitely her! She was buried with her husband, Everett Cheney. The odd thing is that she and her half-sister share the SAME NAME. I had to make sure it wasn't her and it wasn't. There's eight years between the two of them and the younger sister married a man named Arthur Dinges.  I bet things got real confusing around the dinner table when the two were growing up. From what I understand, one sister went by Mary and the other went by Rose. It's hard to say who was who. Maybe they alternated every week?

    With the discovery of the last Coppola child at Saint Patrick's that I knew about, I was off to my next adventure.

    On the way out of Saint Patrick's, I took some photos that I'm frankly not that proud of. The sun was setting and when I took the pictures, I caught some serious lens flare. The only person who wouldn't complain about them would be J.J. Abrams. See his reboot of "Star Trek" for details. 

    While we drove to our next destination, Bob told me he never actually went to Walnut before. That made sense. None of Bob's relatives are at Walnut. Why would he go there? Sure he could help maintain the grounds. But, I think he has his hands full with St. Patrick's, St. James and Linwood! Let's give the guy a break, huh?

    At least he knew the way and that was the important thing. He wondered if I was looking for anyone in particular. I said I was looking for my 3rd great-grandfather, Jeremiah Felker and other Felkers in the area. 

    By the time we got there, I noticed how wooded it seemed to be. I told Bob that the cemetery was supposedly haunted. He said "Yeah, it looks like it!" Seriously, I could hear the "Scooby Doo" intro playing in my head as we rode around the place.

    To my dismay, the sun was setting faster than we could drive. We drove past my great-grandparents' Austin and Henrietta Felker's stone and thankfully pictures were already taken of their final resting place. I saw Jeremiah's stone in the middle of a small clearing surrounded by several of his children and grandchildren. Sadly, the stone appeared to be at a 45 degree angle. I was reluctant to touch it and straighten it out. 

    I only had time to take that one picture and it was worth it. I would've uploaded it to his Find a Grave profile, but, there are already two photos there. One is from 2010 and the other from just two years ago. Time has not been kind to the stone. See what I mean when I talked about people not being able to maintain the stone? That's exactly what happened here. Jeremiah passed away in 1918. I bet it's been several decades since a family member visited his final resting spot.

    Anyway, I wish we had more time to explore Walnut. The next time Bob offers to go on a cemetery run, I'll ask him if he wants to go to Walnut again because there are still a few more people I wish to find like his wife, Elizabeth.That adventure and a few others will have to wait for another day. It might be best to go earlier in the day so I don't feel rushed and pictures won't come complete with a lens flare!!

See ya next time!