‘Tales from Pioneers & Soldiers Cemetery’ Archives
“Who Dyed?” “What is next to Which?” “Who”'s on First?” *
By Sue Hunter Wier Uncle Peter first? Joan Wardwell second?, all at Hodsdon”'s at Bloomington and Lake Farm next to Layman”'s In the late 19-teens and early 1920s several newspaper articles claimed that “Uncle” Peter Wardell (sometimes Wardwell or Waddell) was the second (or even the first) person buried in Minneapolis Pioneers and Soldiers Memorial Cemetery. He was buried, so the stories go, either under what is now the bus stop at Cedar Avenue and Lake Street or in the far southeastern corner of the cemetery at Lake Street and 21st Avenue. Supposedly, Uncle Peter was an employee of Martin Layman who had moved to Minnesota with members of the Layman family in 1853. There”'s only one problem””“Uncle” Peter didn”'t exist. The confusion about this imaginary man is understandable, though. There is a person with a similar name who was among the earliest burials in the cemetery. Her name was Joan Robbins Wardwell. Mrs. Wardwell [...]
Deaths of entire family grieves Cora Stickney Deaths of husband and three children within 15 years grieved Cora Stickney greatly highlighted by 80 day vigil of daughter”'s “trance”
By Sue Hunter Weir It wasn”'t often that the death of someone buried in Layman”'s Cemetery was reported in the New York Times, but the story of Cora Stickney”'s burial was a most unusual, almost gothic, tale. Cora was the daughter of John H. and Ann Stickney; her parents were transplanted New Englanders, who moved to Minnesota shortly after the Civil War. Mr. Stickney was a Civil War veteran who served in the 16th Maine Infantry. After arriving in Minneapolis he went into business but by the early 1870s was in poor health, and on March 20, 1876, two weeks shy of his 34th birthday, he died of “quick consumption”. Less than six months later their youngest son and namesake, John Hanson Stickney, died from scarlet fever at the age of two. Ann Stickney went to work as a teacher to support her two surviving children, Cora and William. The 1880 federal census shows that Cora, then age 12, was no longer in school but working as an apprentice to a hair [...]
Potter”'s Field Tales no less rich and fascinating! Generosity doesn”'t tell it all!
By Sue Hunter Weir There are 350 people buried in the cemetery”'s Potters Field whose remains were used as research subjects in anatomy courses at the University of Minnesota during the years 1914-1916. They were, to the say the least, a colorful lot: homeless men, prison inmates, men who were both the instigators and victims of crime. If they had one characteristic that they share was their social isolation; when they died, their bodies went unclaimed by friends or family. Other traits that many, though not all of them, shared, were alcoholism, mental illness and the effects of poverty. In the early part of the last century, state law required the county coroner to turn over the remains of anyone whose body went unclaimed to medical schools. Because so many people believed that their bodies and souls were to be reunited on Judgment Day, the idea of dissection was, for the majority of people, unthinkable. As a result, there was a shortage of cadavers which [...]
