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Serving Northern St. Louis County, Minnesota

Grave hunting, plastic flowers, and family grudges

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Memorial Day weekend is ahead of us, and perhaps you’ve seen folks taking their cemetery baskets in to greenhouses for filling, or they are buying the flowers to plant themselves. You’ll see a run on those rather gaudy plastic flowers, too, some stapled to wreaths or crosses, the ones with the really stiff polyester ribbons that will last until the end of time, thus providing that “don’t need to water” option.

I admit I have used those on the family plot in Hoyt Lakes a couple of times, “Taconite Hill,” as the final resting place was referred to in our family. Face it, I live up in Ely, so trips to water flowers at the cemetery are not going to happen. Anyhow, Mother would think it extravagant to carry on like that over her grave because she was never sentimental.

Over the years I recall myself card shopping for mom’s birthday, or other proclaimed holiday, standing while poring over the Hallmark rack looking for “that lovely verse” that would touch mom so deeply she’d shed a tear and hang onto that card, reviewing it periodically over the years to catch the warm feeling of its first arrival.

“NOT!” It was more likely I’d walk by her kitchen wastebasket a day or two afterwards and see the lovely-versed card lying in the garbage, adorned with coffee grounds and a wad of gum with a Kleenex attached to it. I’d think, “Wow mom, I took time looking for that card, or gee you are unsentimental!” I started to tease her about her behavior at one point. It became a family joke, “Mom will just throw it away anyways,” we’d say. She’d laugh, with no intention of altering her behavior. It’s just how she was.

I’ve now become one who doesn’t fuss over gravesites either. Aside from the initial placement of funeral flowers, or on occasion, when younger and more dramatic, I would find myself carrying on a bit at the family plot, speaking my thoughts, followed by moderate wailing, sighing, regrouping and leaving the plastic arrangement, to sooth myself, mainly.

I believe souls move on after death, it’s not just the big “dirt nap”, but they aren’t hanging out on “Taconite Hill.” I think of my deceased family and loved ones with respect and some added humor here and there along the way. It’s just that as we get older death gets to be a common occurrence and for the most part it’s easier to accept.

I do however find the history aspect of graveyards, like “Taconite Hill” fascinating! This weekend, I and my partner in “commotion and coleslaw”, Dennis, will be “grave searching” on the Iron Range. It’ll be my memorial time, spent considering the colorful characters in my family history.

In fact, I have recently been taking advantage of the free trial period at Ancestry.com and learning all kinds of interesting things about my family through census records, birth and death information, old addresses and even some photos.

We will be heading south of Biwabik to the cemetery where I have a great-aunt buried, who died in infancy in the early 1900s. I found the grave many years ago and know we will be looking for it in the bramble close to the lakeshore. “Watch out for ticks!” I want to check the dates and other information on the stone. We will take a drive over to the Chisholm Cemetery where lots of family are buried: Jussilas, Tuomis and Johnsons. 

While growing up, I remember my dad being angry at his grandfather, who had lived in Chisholm and Biwabik where he operated taverns. Dad’s anger was a result of this grandfather having left his wife and five children to return to Finland. This was during the Finnish nationalist resistance against political and cultural domination by Tsarist Russia (or the Russian Empire) just prior to World War I.

He did return from Finland, collect his family and head west to work in the mines in Butte, Montana, where he died at age 38 from lung disease, leaving his wife with a handful of kids to raise. The family seemed to have adopted a negative tone about this entire relative’s life.  Dad came from a family where if you took the time to develop a grudge you might as well hang onto it for good.

In fact, Dad had a grudge against the town of Biwabik for installing two sets of stoplights on the near desolate road that passes through town. While waiting for the light to turn green he’d empty his ashtray in a sort of quiet revolt. Gilbert also lost Dad when he’d driven over from Hoyt Lakes one day and the sausage store wasn’t open.

These things are all humorous to me now and as I drive along visiting cemeteries I will be having an interesting historical, somewhat hysterical, Memorial Day weekend. So I hope the weather will cooperate, allowing us to stop at a drive-in for a burger basket (watch the slaw) and frosty cold root beer. We most likely will come across a garage sale along the way and stop to hunt for a new treasure to add to my collection.

Lynn O’Hara can be reached at scarlet@frontiernet.net.