I drove 175 miles today on what I was convinced was a sure bet.
I set out to match up a distinctive gravestone with the person whose remains lay beneath it.
It's a turn-of-the-century photo - another unlabeled one from the
Williams family photo album.
I was just sure the grave had to be in Oakland Cemetery in Russellville.
Several of my Williamses, including Maxie and Jo's two daughters, Mildred Imognene, and
Katherine Leah are buried there.
Why would we have such a large photo - the photo itself measures about 6" by 6" not including its black cardboard mount - unless this was the grave of someone in the family?
Mercifully, our temp stayed under 100 today - it was only 99.
So my first pass through the cemetery was in the car. And none of the tall monuments matched.
So I got out of the car in selected locations and started looking for a monument that could have been broken off, with other stones around it as in the photo. With a raised concrete border around the plot. Or concrete overgrown with grass.
I looked for the fence surrounding the plot in front of the monument.
Or evidence there had been one at one time.
Nothing. Zip, nada, zilch.
But it wasn't a wash...
Because I found Grace Electra Shinn's grave. She was the daughter of my great grandaunt,
Mildred Carlton "Minnie" Williams and Josiah Hazen Shinn.
Grace's grave is with her paternal grandmother's, and her uncle's. Her grandma - Josiah's mother - was Elizabeth Frances Gilpin. After she divorced Josiah's dad, she married Samuel Reed Judd. The stone for the family plot says
Shinn on one side, and
Judd on the other.
But the question still remains...
Whose grave is it?
