Equinox

It was easy to miss last Tuesday, but the fall equinox did arrive and pass and the sundown hours have begun to outdistance sunrise hours, a trend that will continue until solstice on the 21st of December when the days will begin to lengthen again as winter deepens.

Fall, however, waited to blow in here until last night, after a warm and windy day that as sunset neared inspired the cormorants to undertake a program of unusual aerial acrobatics and disrupted egret landing patterns, too.

Part of the game plan here is to see just how long the egrets stick around before heading on to warmer places farther south and how long I can substitute bundling up for the heat of a furnace.

Goose season opened Saturday and like the brief duck season a few days earlier seems to be a disappointment. Skillful and seasoned hunters do OK, but the yahoos for the most part have been left shooting at empty sky.

Two pair of Canadas were on the marsh this morning, but that's the most I've seen there so far. I'm grateful for that since low goose population means low hunter (non-existent actually) population, too, and safe walking and looking.

Sentinal hard maples, those I usually look to to tell me when summer's end is near, have begun to turn and drop their leaves.


Walnuts, too, but that's hardly news or a show. There were so many black walnuts along Iowa streams when pioneers arrived that entire cabins were built of and other buildings framed in their lovely wood, often used for interior trim as well. But walnuts are messy and troublesome to live near --- last to leaf out in the spring, first to drop their leaves in late summer, guaranteed to discourage other plantings nearby and to spit in a sticky and discoloring way on anything parked or built under them.

Even the nuts, with the tastiest of meats, are challenging --- difficult to shell, hard to crack and time-consuming to pick out. My dad tried a variety of shelling tactics --- spreading them on the garden shed roof to cure then doing it by hand, spreading them in the barnyard driveways to run over again and again with heavy equipment, using an old-fashioned corn-sheller. My mother, who had infinite patience, was one of the few people I knew who would deal with the shelled result joyfully. And those of us who enjoyed her baking enjoyed the results of that patience joyfully, too.

Historic and hallowed places

A typical Chariton Cemetery view, here from the west base of the southeast hill toward the west.

Preservationist and architectural historian Molly Myers Naumann visits with Frank Mitchell prior to last Thursday’s meeting at the Chariton Cemetery shelter house.

Big news by my definition at least is the Chariton Cemetery’s nomination by City Council and Cemetery Board to the National Register of Historic Places. That nomination is likely to be approved after an Oct. 9 hearing in Des Moines.

I like to brag about the cemetery’s beauty and interest and this nomination highlights important contributing factors to that, including a 40-year relationship between the Cemetery Board and Ray F. Wyrick, a Des Moines-based landscape architect and cemetery designer.

All significant features that can be traced to that relationship --- the overall park-like design of the cemetery (most likely launched by the Stanton family when the cemetery was privately owned), the “English cottage” shelter house, the “Baby Heart” for infant burials that was among the first of its sort in the state and the cobblestone entrance gates, built in 1937 by WPA workers to a Wyrick design, survive.

So it was fun last Thursday to attend a public meeting at the cemetery shelter house during which Molly Myers Naumann of Ottumwa, a respected preservationist and architectural historian, reviewed the nomination she had prepared.

All of us present I think learned a lot about how the cemetery developed in the years after 1924 when the city purchased it from Gertrude Stanton, widow of Dr. John H. Stanton, and their daughters and developed it into what it is today.

I suppose I’m as interested, however, in the earliest history of the cemetery and that’s a little murky because records of the 1864-1902 era were destroyed, apparently in a fire, about 1902.

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I can tell you for sure that the Chariton Cemetery began on 25 June 1864, during the Civil War, when 19 investors --- all prominent Chariton men of that time, all now largely forgotten --- formed The Chariton Cemetery Co. and purchased 80 acres of rolling, hilly property with a stream bisecting --- a typical southern Iowa landscape --- just south of town on the highlands above the Chariton River Valley and descending into it. The cemetery property now encompasses about 60 acres.

It had become clear by 1864 that the two cemeteries then serving Chariton would be inadequate. The original cemetery within city limits was located on the current site of Columbus School, a half block north of where I live, but it had rapidly become surrounded by homes and businesses and had no potential for expansion.

The other cemetery, now called the Douglass Pioneer Cemetery, is located just southeast of town off the Blue Grass Road. It had grown up willy-nilly around the graves of the earliest pioneers at Chariton Point, most likely including those left behind by Mormon refugees from Nauvoo who over-wintered near it in 1846-47 --- the first Euro-Americans to actually live for a time at Chariton Point.


The Chariton Cemetery's main entrance gateway was built by WPA workers in 1937 to a design by Ray F. Wyrick.

Once the Chariton Cemetery Co. was organized, its investors set about designing a conventional cemetery for its time that filled roughly the north fifth of the current cemetery landscape. If you enter the cemetery’s main gate just off Highway 14 today, you may drive west on an arrow-straight lane to the west end of the cemetery. That lane divided the original cemetery approximately in half. Take a short loop south and turn east and you’re driving along the south boundary of the original cemetery. The basic lot unit here was 20 feet square.


Looking west from near the entrance along the lane that divides the original Chariton Cemetery roughly in half.

Once the new cemetery was open for business, all the bodies (we hope) were exhumed at the Columbus School site and reburied here. Many bodies also were brought in from Douglass Cemetery, which continued to be used for a time as potter’s field and then was allowed to fall into an awful state of abandonment and disrepair. A potter’s field also was developed on a pretty hilltop in the southwest part of the new property, a suitable distance from paying guests (this since has been incorporated into the cemetery proper although all but a few of its perhaps 250 graves remain unmarked).


Mary Sutphin Howard may have been the first person buried in Chariton's original city cemetery, located where Columbus School now stands.

It’s fun to play the who-was-first? game with the cemetery, but destruction of those early records makes it impossible to be sure. Annie Maria (Scott) Bentley is the source of a story that her mother, Mary (Sutphin) Scott/Howard, who died Oct. 12, 1850, at the age of 47, “was the first burial in Chariton cemetery,” but that most likely refers to burial in the cemetery on the Columbus School site since Mrs. Bentley also noted that her mother’s body had been removed from that location to the new cemetery. Of course this also could be interpreted to mean that Mrs. Scott/Howard’s body was the first to be reburied at the new location. Whatever the case, Mrs. Scott/Howard’s fine tombstone survives in the new cemetery in a remarkable state of preservation.



Weathered tombstones mark the gaves of Margaret Cochran and her son, William, whose remains may have been the first reinterred in the new Chariton Cemetery.

Another alleged “first” is found in a Chariton Herald article of 30 January 1902 reporting upon “interesting cemetery books,” no longer extant, that had just been complied by Dr. James Eddington Stanton, John H. Stanton’s father. According to that article, Dr. Stanton had determined that “the first persons buried there (new Chariton Cemetery) being Margaret T. and William Cochran, twins, who were aged 6 years, 5 months and 18 days at death, and were buried on November 2, 1853.”

Either Dr. Stanton or the Herald reporter had gone rather badly astray here since Margaret T. and William were mother and son rather than twin children. William’s small stone, now leaning against that of his mother, has broken off above date of death and age and its base is not evident, but there is no reason to doubt the death date and age given in the Herald report. This family, consisting of James W. Cochran, 34, Margaret, 31, John, 12, Elizabeth, 8, James G., 7, and William, 3, is found in the 1850 census of Thomson Township, Delaware County, Ohio.

The 1856 census of Chariton enumerates James W. (a farmer), Margaret, John, Elizabeth and James G., all born in Ohio, who had arrived in Iowa three years previously. William is missing, so it is entirely possible he did die in November 1853, age 6, soon after the family’s move west. I have been unable to decipher the entire inscription yet on Margaret’s stone, but she certainly died after 1856 and probably before 1860, by which year the remainder of the Cochran family had vanished from Lucas County.

Again, what the Herald report meant by “first” is impossible to interpret. Perhaps the bodies of William Cochran and his mother were the first reburied in the new cemetery. Who can say?

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As the years passed, ownership of shares in the Chariton Cemetery Co. became concentrated in the hands of Dr. James Eddington Stanton, a native of Belmont County, Ohio, who arrived in Chariton with his family after brief residence in Indiana in 1862. Two of Dr. Stanton’s sons, John H. and Theodore P., followed him into the medical field and also became widely known and respected Chariton physicians.

J.E. Stanton’s obituary (born 15 May 1828, he died in Chariton on 6 November 1908), states that “In later years he retired from active practice and devoted himself largely to beautifying and caring for the city of the dead. He was the principal stockholder in the Chariton Cemetery Association and God’s acre was his special pride.”

Dr. Stanton seems to have been in control of the cemetery by 1887 when he constructed toward the west end of the original cemetery the Stanton mausoleum, with capacity for 30 interments, intended for his own family and the public as well. This has since been demolished and its remaining occupants, including several Stantons, rather unceremoniously reinterred on its site.

Upon J.E. Stanton’s death, controlling interest appears to have passed to his son, Dr. J.H. Stanton, who continued to operate it as a private business until his own death on 25 May 1922.

His obituary (Chariton Herald Patriot, 1 June 1922) states that “He was an active member of the American Association of Cemetery Superitendents and has attended the annual meeting for the past several years in his effort to obtain knowledge and information as to cemetery affairs that would assist him in his untiring efforts in beautifying and improving the Chariton Cemetery to which he devoted a great deal of care and attention and of which he was superintendent.”

The absence of records from the Stanton era make it difficult to determine the role the doctors, father and son, played in the overall design of the cemetery. It is certain that they expanded it considerably along the easterly ridge as far south as the highest point before descent into the river valley begins. Stanton-era extenson along the westerly ridge as far south as the Copeland mausoleum also is evident.

It seems likely to me that the Stantons imposed the curvilinear park-like theme, a prevailing trend in late 19th century cemetery design, picked up and carried forward admirably after 1924 by the Chariton Cemetery Board and its architect, Ray Wyrick.

Upon Dr. J.H. Stanton’s 1922 death, the cemetery passed to his wife, Gertrude, and the Stanton daughters.

Public discontent about Stanton ownership of the cemetery seems to have come to a head just before J.H. Stanton’s death, so it is possible to speculate that stress resulting from it might have been a factor in the unexpected heart attack that killed him on May 25.

The Herald Patriot carred a report in its edition of 18 May 1922 of a City Council meeting held the preceding Monday during which “nearly a score of prominent businessmen” encourage the council to take over ownership and management of the cemetery from the Stantons.

“It was stated that the cemetery is now owned by a closed corporation as a source of profit. That no sinking fund has been set aside for the perpetual care and upkeep of the cemetery and that there is danger than when the remaining lots are sold there will be no source of income to maintain or improve it,” The Herald Patriot reported.

“There is a great deal of feeling in the matter throughout the city and the businessmen stated their belief that it was almost the unanimous wish of the citizens that action be taken at once,” according to the report.

“It was stated at the meeting that deeds given for lots were indefinite as to dimensions, that prices were exorbitant, that deeds were not stamped as provided by law, that no provisions were made for future care, that foundations for monuments were not properly laid, and that the self-respect of the community demanded public ownership.”

There also seem to have been maintenance issues --- overgrowth and poorly-surfaced driveways that made it difficult to enter the cemetery at times.

The council resolved to acquire the cemetery at that meeting, but it required two years of negotiation with Gertrude Stanton to accomplish that. Finally, during May of 1924 according to a 29 May Herald Patriot report, the city agreed to pay the Stanton heirs $10,000 for the cemetery and its undeveloped acreage.

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Whether by luck or design, City Council next appointed a cemetery board of bright and forward-looking men (keep in mind this still was a time when such weighty affairs were considered inappropriate fare for women) --- J.H. Darrah, George Carpenter, L.L. Guernsey, J.H. Curtis and Samuel McKlveen. Widely-respected contractor E.C. Best soon was added.

In short order, the board hired another remarkable and forward-looking male, Orren A. Lamb, as caretaker and overseer, and Wyrick, as landscape arthitect. Although Lamb died nine years later, the relationship with Wyrick continued into the 1960s.

The first order of business was to clear the site of more than 1,000 volunteer trees, up to 400 large trees perhaps planted in the 1860s and much undergrowth (a report in the 1875 “Historical Atlas of Iowa” states that the original cemetery had been enclosed by an Osage orange hedge and that maples, probably a soft variety, had been planted along its driveways). In addition, driveways were graveled (or regraveled): By the late 1920s 11 carloads of gravel and been applied at a cost of $1,100.

Wyrick came up with an overall design for future development that probably expanded upon a Stanton idea --- curving drives that follow the lay of the land and create vistas. He even included a lake, never built, with the stream that flowed southwesterly through the property as its water source.

The stated goal of everyone concerned here was to make the cemetery a place as much for the living as the dead and anyone who visits the cemetery regularly today and sees just how many people use its driveways for walks or jogs or just as paths while browsing among the tombstones can see how well they succeeded.

As the need for more cemetery lots occurred, Wyrick platted areas within the overall design. His only failure was in a small area north of the shelter house than was intended to be a “memoral park” with no tombstones above ground level. Lucas Countyans failed to buy into that idea.

Wyrick also designed the plantings scheme of mixed trees and shrubs that continues to make the cemetery such a pretty place today, although removal and replacement of plantings that have matured and reached the end of their useful lives are major challenges face by the current cemetery board.

Three features that are significant parts of the Historic Places nomination were added during the 1920s and 1930s.



The "English cottage" shelter house from the northeast (top) and from the southeast, showing the Baby Heart placed near it in 1930. The red brick cross in the chimney (farther down) suggests the building also was intended for use as a chapel.

In the late 1920s, the board sought and implemented plans for a brick shelter house designed as an “English cottage” with a commodious front porch enclosed in part by elaborate lattice work and a large airy room that could be used by visitors to the cemetery and by mourners in need of a place to greet friends after a burial. A small restroom was included in the plan. A red brick cross embedded in the exterior of the fireplace chimney suggests it also was intended for use as a chapel.


This building is almost entirely intact, including cast-concrete urns at its approach and a set of wicker furniture donated by Chariton women in 1929. A 1950s addition to the lower level for office and equipment storage space is entirely in keeping with the exterior, including half-timbering in the gable. Only a later metal-clad pole building nearby to house larger equipment is out of place. It’s not clear exactly who designed the shelter house, although current thinking attributes it to E.C. Best, contractor and cemetery board member.

In 1930, the baby heart, thought to have been inspired by an innovation at Forest Lawn Cemetery in Los Angeles, was placed southeast of the shelter house --- three concentric rows of infant graves with identical markers arranged in the shape of a “mother’s heart” with a small monument in the middle. Once the heart was filled, straight rows of infant graves were added to the east.

And finally the cobblestone entrance gateway, added by WPA workers in 1937 to a Wyrick design --- very typical of the 1930s WPA era, designed to embrace and welcome visitors with its broad curves toward massive portal piers, something it continues to do today.

Note: Photos of the north drive and cemetery entrance were taken a couple of years ago (fall is not quite this advanced in southern Iowa at the moment). A good deal of the information about the cemetery after 1924 is taken from Molly Myers Naumann’s National Register of Historic Places nomination document.

American heroes, too

The part of it that knocked the breath right out of a guy came just after sunset Sunday when the generators were cranked up, giant floodlights hired to illuminate The Moving Wall at night were turned on and its surface sprang to life again.

The name of each Wayne County boy inscribed there was spoken. After each name, the bell at old New York Church tolled.

Then a colour guard salute, Taps, dismissal and silence.

It was a way to say a collective goodbye heretofore undreamed of out here in the corn fields east of Allerton and something that none of us lucky enough to be there is likely to forget or experience again. Most I’d guess, and there were a few hundred of us, held at least one young life, lost long ago, in our hearts.

A few hours later, after 10, the lights were dimmed, the flags lowered, the panels dismantled and packed and now those fields belong to the crickets and cicadas again.

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This was such a great story that I couldn’t leave it alone. Four visits over the course of three days --- no problem when Allerton is only a 35-minute drive away, but it seemed excessive to some.

Part of it was ceremonial as parts of all our lives are, rituals to create the idea of order where there often is none.

Years ago the fourth stanza of British poet Laurence Binyon’s World War I-era “The Fallen” stuck in my head:

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

I wanted to remember that way, given the opportunity, and so I did --- at sunrise one beautiful morning; at sunset on another.

Running late because of another commitment Sunday, I broke a couple of speed limits to get there by 7 p.m. for the closing ceremony and almost made it. Rounding the next to the last curve on dusty gravel, dodging deer on the back roads down from Corydon, the great red ball of the setting sun came rolling directly down the middle of the road at me. Other evenings, that sight alone would have been enough.

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Other times I went to watch and listen and talk, trying to understand what was going on here, marveling at the vision, organization, giving, love and hard work invested by hundreds of volunteers in Allerton and its neighbors to launch and sustain the wall’s four-day mission.

How intimately we related to those panels which, after all, aren’t really the Wall, just a reproduction. Everyone touched them, some with finger tips, others with both hands laid flat. Some leaned foreheads against the panels. Others bent themselves into painful configurations to photograph or take a rubbing of a name. I ran two fingers back and forth across a friend’s name --- on two occasions.

Most seemed to have come, and thousands did, some from remarkable distances, to touch at least one name.

But who would have guessed without observing that even that intimacy between people and polished aluminum would require a small army of volunteers armed with large dark cloths who patrolled the wall periodically, always respectful of visitors, polishing away the smudges, restoring the mirror-like surface.

And the dust, inevitable in gravel-road country. Volunteers in trucks watered the roads to the site, then watered them again --- time after time. No visitors were troubled by dust, nor did any reach the Wall.

Parking could have been a problem, but volunteers patrolled long lines of parked and parking cars offering rides to all. On Saturday, the heaviest traffic day, most visitors were diverted to a parking lot at the athletic field on Allerton’s east edge, then brought to the site by tractor and wagon.

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Then there was the level of respect in a disrespectful age, not only for the Wall itself but also for the visitors. Most of us were greeted at the entrance by volunteers and ushered briefly --- some by Legionaries in immaculate uniforms, others by the Patriot Guard, boots and leather and Harley t-shirts, souvenir-encrusted vests, some looking as if they had just come in off the road, as some had.


Wheelchairs in formation awaited those who couldn’t make it on their own down the graveled avenue of flags to the forecourt, then around it to a table where another small volunteer army awaited to help visitors find names, around the Wall itself, into the forecourt just to look a while and finally back. The men who pushed those wheelchairs were the hardest workers of all, laboring time after time over rough surfaces with their charges.

It all seemed flawless, effortless, to those of us who visited --- and a friend who volunteered confirmed almost flawless, but quickly relieved me of any misunderstandings I might have had about effort.

I came in Sunday evening half way through the recognition of volunteers and was sorry about that --- I had wanted to hear more about those who had worked so hard.

I suppose I could go on here --- school kids flooding the site Friday morning, delivered by buses from various districts; how well the Wall fitted in amid corn fields and endless sky surround by Iowa icons --- country church, country school, the round barn itself; the peacefulness of it all. But this is enough.

The Moving Wall and the names on it were the focal point Thursday-Sunday and the story behind the Moving Wall is an inspiration. It was fascinating to watch people interact with the Wall. But the heroes in this small corner of Iowa in this instance were those who envisioned the Wall’s visit and then made it come true. Is it possible to be any prouder of your neighbors?

Cemetery walks and a highly historical Saturday

Here are a couple of things that are on my agenda during the next couple of weeks, events of the sort that I find endlessly fascinating. If you share any of these interests, feel free to come along for the ride:

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The annual Chariton Cemetery Walk, sponsored by the Historic Preservation Commission, will be held from 4 to 7 p.m. this Sunday. Departures by bus will be approximately at the top of the hours from the Freight House, located two blocks north of the northwest corner of the square and a block west. Admission will be charged (proceeds to cemetery projects) and refreshments served.

This year's featured cemetery residents will be members of the Nicholas S. Melville family, long-time Chariton furniture dealers and undertakers; E. H. Best, a prominent contractor; Charles F. Wennerstrum, Iowa Supreme Court justice and Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal judge; and James A. Penick, a silver-tongued orator.

Those who attend also will hear a bit about the Chariton Cemetery's pending nomination to the National Register of Historic Places (more about that another time) and see a grave "witching" demonstration on the John Rinehart lot by members of the Lucas County Genealogical Society.

I'll be the tour guide for this event, riding along on the bus, pointing out points of interest, sharing cemetery lore and trying not to fall down.

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The following Saturday, Sept. 26, will be a busy one at the Lucas County Historical Society's museum campus in west Chariton.

Bob Mullenix of Red Oak and Elwyn Taylor of Ames will be in the commons area of the John L. Lewis Building at 10 a.m. to present a free program on southern Iowa's pioneer roads. Everyone's welcome!

At 2 p.m., the museum complex will close officially for the season with an old-fashioned hymn sing in Otterbein Church, dear to my heart because my great-great-grandparents, John and Isabelle Redlingshafer, and many other kinfolk were among that building's United Brethren in Christ founding congregation. I'll be providing the welcome, making a few introductions and offering a brief history of the church --- but promise not to preach. Refreshments on the grounds will follow. Everything's free.

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Finally, don't forget that The Moving Wall is on display 24 hours a day until 10 p.m. Sunday at the Round Barn Site, a mile east of Allerton down in Wayne County. There will be a program by Vietnam veterans at 1:30 p.m. Saturday and a closing ceremony at 7 p.m. Sunday.

When morning gilds the skies ...

I've been chasing the sunrise lately, but lagging on the catch. My own fault since I'm always up at 5. September has been extraordinarily busy, however, and it's easy to get preoccupied with the details --- this morning it was laundry --- and miss the big show. Glanced out the back door and, whoops, there was the sun. I'll get there yet.

The promised sunflower show is developing nicely and it tends to look best beginning about 7:30 when the sun is high enough to illuminate it any way.

Asters (I think these are New England, but won't swear to it) are coming into full bloom, too, offering counterpoint.

What a great day to be alive!

The Moving Wall

The Moving Wall comes to Allerton this week, a mighty effort by what many would call a mighty small town --- population somewhere between 550 and 600. But size like many things is relative and when you look over southwest from Confidence or that window seat at the No Name Café along Highway 2 in Promise City, Allerton can seem pretty darned big.

Allerton also has picked up a reputation as the little town that can --- as opposed to other somewhat larger towns I could name where the first reaction to any new idea generally is we-couldn’t-possibly-do-that.

So it’s not surprising that The Wall is coming to Allerton, but it is remarkable, something to be proud of.

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This is the 25th year for The Moving Wall, a half-size replica of that polished black granite wall in Washington, D.C., The Vietnam Veterans Memorial, that contains the names of more than 58,000 who died for me, and for you, in the order they were taken from us.

It was the idea of John Devitt, a San Jose, Calif., native and Army helicopter door gunner in Vietnam, who wished to share the experience of The Wall with those who would have no opportunity to travel to Washington to see it. It remains his life work.

Two of the replicas travel the country spring, summer and fall. This is the second and final appearance of The Moving Wall in Iowa this year.

The Wall will open to the public at 11 a.m. Thursday at the Round Barn Site, a collection of vintage buildings in open fields a mile east of Allerton. The opening ceremony will be held at 7 p.m. Thursday, a presentation by Vietnam veterans is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Saturday and the closing ceremony will begin at 7 p.m. Sunday. The site will be open and accessible around the clock until 10 p.m. Sunday.

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Wayne County, a small and intensely rural place, took a big hit during Vietnam --- Richard Cesar, Larry Gosch, Jerry Hickerson, Terry Leazer, John Lockwood, Dennis Levis, Roger McClatchey and Gary Moore. Albert Crouch, too, who called Seymour home although his family lived across the county line in Appanoose.

With the exception of Richard, buried at Rockford, Ill., and Roger, buried in Nebraska, I can walk you to all their graves if you’d like --- Larry and Gary in Evergreen at Lineville; Jerry at South Lawn in Seymour; Terry at Shriver, west of Seymour; Albert, at Livingston, southeast of Seymour.

But it’s Dennis Levis I’ve been thinking about, buried there at Allerton. Look northwest from the Round Barn Site and you can see the cemetery, about a mile away. What in the world would he make of all this?

Born in Chariton, Dennis was a young man with ties to several communities. He graduated from Seymour High School in 1964 while living with his family on a farm west of Promise City. When he died, his parents, Delrein and Gweniverre (Richard) Levis, were living in Chariton again as was his sister, Nancy. The Richards were Wayne County people, which explains why funeral services and burial took place in Allerton.

Dennis had attended Centerville Community College and in 1968 earned a degree in accounting from Drake University. He married Linda Bellomo in 1968 in Michigan.

Sgt. Dennis Levis, Co. B, 196th Light Infantry Brigade, Americal Division, was killed instantly during a mortar attack on the Kham Duc air strip near Da Nang on July 20, 1970. He was 23.

I’ve never met anyone not profoundly moved by a visit to The Wall in Washington, D.C., but it seems so far from home, so far from the places these young men returned to in thoughts and dreams while half a world away, places never seen again. I wonder if they might not feel more comfortable gathering round now, as this week ends and we come together to see their names and remember in a field that not only looks like home, but is.

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In the week past, as the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon passed and as the death toll in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq continued to move beyond 5,000, I reread Rick Maddy’s story. That story, eloquently told, is here. Scroll down, it’s entitled “February 28, 1968.”

My buddy Darlene and I have talked a lot about Rick since a week or so ago when he wandered into the Lucas County Genealogical Society library looking for information about his family. Although born in Knoxville and with deep roots here, he moved with his family to Washington state when he was two.

Darlene wowed Rick by opening her newspaper index and locating a story in the Chariton newspapers of 1968 about the critical wounds he suffered in Vietnam during that year, when he was 18.

Not afraid to ask tough questions, she asked if he would mind talking about his wounds and the ambush in which three comrades were killed, his arms were blown away and he sustained other critical injuries. And so he did.

It was only then that I really noticed what you’d call the “handicaps,” arms that barely work, surgically arranged as his wounds were treated at his specific request so that he would be able to drive, elbow missing, no triceps, some fingers working, others not. But this guy was a happy man and that made all the difference; it made you feel good to be around him.

Monday night, we talked with others who had met Rick during his visit --- Marilyn at the Lucas County Historical Society, Mary Ellen at the Russell Historical Society. Neither had even noticed the handicaps. There goes that happy man factor again.

None of us know Rick well enough to comprehend the ups and downs he’s gone though during the last 40 years, nor did we ask about the dark days that undoubtedly have been a factor in his life. What we saw was a triumph of human spirit, Rick’s gift to us.

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I am not a believer. Vietnam was a disaster. Afghanistan and Iraq will be, too. Thousands have died and will continue to die for causes that in the end will prove to have been futile, or false. There will be another wall for the newly dead. War-related wounds will continue to become decisive factors in thousands of young lives. We will declare victory again and leave. We will lose again. The only winners, consistently and without a doubt, are the troops, but the cost is too high. It makes me so damn mad.

But if you asked me what in my life I’m proudest of, it would be the fact I’m a Vietnam veteran --- and that has nothing to do with anything I did during a short and undistinguished career involving work that was interesting at the time but ultimately futile.

It has everything to do with the 58,000 on the Wall, the untold thousands that dirty war has taken down since, and the Rick Maddys of the world who walked through hell and came out triumphant, combat veterans for the most part. It's something about walking for a time in their light, but I can’t explain it.

So I’m going down to see The Moving Wall in a day or two and touch a couple of names and think about this some more, some early morning I think when the sun is rising and there’s hope in the air. Maybe I’ll see you there.

Hey Chariton, have a great day!

And make that 160 candles if you’re planning to bake. But no gifts please --- and cards I guess should be addressed to the city clerk. Chariton celebrates its 160th birthday on Friday, Sept. 11. My goodness how time flies. Seems like only yesterday ….

Lucas County’s very first election took place on a Monday, Aug. 6, 1849, at the cabin of William and Nancy McDermott out east along the Squirrel Road there at “Ireland” where timber and prairie met in Cedar Township, about where Bethel Church now sits.

Twenty-five men came on horseback, by wagon and afoot to vote (women couldn’t): William S. “Buck” Townsend, James Roland, Philip G. Dunn, Beresford Robinson, Nelson Lowder, William McDermott, William T. May, Xury E. West, Loyd Jenkins, Elijah Baldwin, Samuel A. Francis, John Yergey, James M. Mercer, Samuel McKinley, James G. Robinson, John Ballard, Thomas Wilson, Peter Phillips, James Peck, Andrew J. Allen, John McMains, John Mercer, Joseph W. Allen, Milton Lowder and E.K. Robinson.

These guys elected three commissioners to govern the newly-organized county --- Jacob Phillips, William T. May and James G. Robinson. One of their first jobs would be to affirm the work of another commission, this one named earlier by the Iowa Legislature, to locate a county seat.

Four days later, on Friday, the 10th of August, the new commissioners trekked over to Chariton Point where old Buck Townsend had a cabin that functioned as a primitive inn at Chariton Point, just southeast along the Blue Grass of the current Chariton.

Buck, a slick operator if ever there was one, had purchased the pre-emption claim to his land there from the Mormons who had held informal but binding title since the winter of 1846-47 when several refugees from Nauvoo had over-wintered there. It apparently had functioned since then as a sort of way station for weary Saints along the trail between Dodge’s Point in Appanoose County and Garden Grove or Mt. Pisgah farther west.


All the county commissioners figured the new county seat would be somewhere near Chariton Point, since it was close to the center of the county; and as you might expect, old Buck figured it would be a real good idea if the town site and his land coincided. That wasn’t to be.

The commissioners organized the county government that day at Buck’s, but since the county seat commissioners had not finished their work, they went home.

That locating commission consisted of Wareham G. Clark of Monroe County, Pardon M. Dodge of Appanoose County and Richard Fisher of Wapello County. The idea behind their appointment was that they would be neutral and pick the most sensible location for a county seat, not the site best attuned to anyone’s specific advantage.

The locating commissioners reportedly spent several days in early September looking around the county and then sent word to the commissioners that they would be ready to report their choice on Tuesday, Sept. 11.

The gathering at Chariton Point for the announcement included not only the locating commissioners and county commissioners but also a variety of hangers-on, some of whom had a financial stake in where the new county seat was located and others who were merely curious.

On the Monday before, county lore holds that everyone assembled for the big day relaxed on a wolf hunt south and east of the point along a creek that was named Wolf to commemorate the occasion. Wolf Creek still is with us, but the accuracy of this account of its naming cannot be verified.

James G. Robinson, writing an account late in life that was published in both Russell and Chariton newspapers, recalled the happenings on the big day itself this way:

“They (the locating commission) came on in September; was in the county two or three weeks. I received word from Mr. (Wareham) Clark stating the day they would determine where to drive the stake, and wishing the commissioners to meet them. I went to Chariton Point and was told the men were out on the prairie northwest. I went to the corner of sections 19, 20, 29 and 30 and there I found five men and two boys with handkerchiefs spread down on the grass with a deck of cards. They had drunk one jug of whisky and was putting a boy on a horse to go for another. They told us at that section corner the committee had determined to drive the stake. That afternoon, they did so, and as they were all three democrats, and anxious to do honor to the democratic administration that had gone out the March before, named the new county seat “Polk.”

Other accounts suggest the locating commissioners didn’t actually drive a stake, but instead that Wareham Clark made the announcement after being hoisted atop a post already placed at the intersection of those sections by Lucas County’s original surveyors. All agree that the location was at the southwest corner of the current Chariton square.

The first challenge once the site was selected was figuring out how to purchase it, since Lucas County land was not yet officially on the market and the county had no money anyway. The county solved the first problem by making a pre-emption claim to the site. The money problem was resolved by Robinson, who purchased a military land warrant from a veteran to whom it had been issued that entitled the bearer to claim 160 acres. By the time the land office opened and the town site actually was entered, the county had sufficient funds to buy it from Robinson.

The name “Polk” didn’t stick. Cooler heads prevailed, the suggestion Greencastle was spurned, too, and finally it was decided simply to drop the “Point” and call it Chariton.

Of course Sept. 11 is another anniversary, too --- of a more recent event that seemed at the time to turn the world upside down. And I don’t mean to diminish the importance of that.

But for now, I’m content to stand here on the prairie near that stake 160 years ago looking west down the draw draining into the Chariton River that now is Court Avenue and off to the rolling hills beyond and think of a time when the future seemed to have no limit and there was hope abroad in the land.

Spider webs and switchgrass

I've been admiring the spider webs these last few early mornings at the marsh, marveling at their number and complexity. It's best to do this early, before the sun burns off moisture that has condensed during the night to outline every detail.

There must be hundreds of thousands of these webs (and arachnidian weavers)executed to varying designs in the acres that make up the marsh. And it's humbling to think of their numbers in comparison to our own and their skill --- marvelous creations woven adroitly without college degrees in engineering or design by critters who work at best for minimum wage.

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Switchgrass weaves its seed-head webs of similar grace and complexity so that they are almost always difficult to photograph and often difficult to see. Not a prefect photo by any means, but I think it's possible to see switchgrass gone to seed here, intermingled with bolder and more obivious indiangrass plumes.

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A merry band of pelicans alighted Tuesday afternoon to join the egrets, cormorants and other evening roosters --- feeding enthusiastically on whatever the east pond has to offer. I saw them early Wednesday, then off they went after a night at the Pin Oak motel.

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I have always tried to be patient with pokey older drivers, taking into consideration the possibility that by grace and good luck I might become one of them. Well, it's happened.

It occurred to me, driving in from the marsh at 8 with a 9 o'clock meeting in the offing, that 45 mph. is about my speed. Gives you a little leeway to look around and, after all, what's your hurry? (This does not apply on the Interstate or routine trips down 34 to Ottumwa, however).

When the cars started to line up behind me on a foggy morning, I picked up speed to lessen frustration and felt downright righteous for doing so.

More prairie sunshine

More sunflowers today, this time saw-tooth (Helianthus grosseserratus) as opposed the previous maximilians. These have been in full bloom for some time (maximilians are just starting to bloom) and will continue until hard frost.

And speaking of bottle gentians (Gentiana andrewsii), here they are hiding in the grass this morning. Fall is definately on the way.

Helianthus maximiliani

The thing about the prairie is this: It is a continual procession of colors and plant shapes and sizes from earliest spring until latest fall when only the bottle gentians, hiding in secret places (but I know where they are), are newly in bloom. Even in the dead of winter when the palette has fewer colors on it the shades are infinite.

The more you look and the more carefully you observe the more there is to see. A prairie may be the greatest show on earth, although it usually gets lesser billing. Too bad there's so little of it left.

The maximilian sunflowers (Helianthus maximiliani) down at Pin Oak are just on the verge of breaking into full bloom. It's going to be quite a performance this year so come on down! We've still got egrets and cormorants and herons and I spooked a white-tail heading back to the truck just as the sun was setting a night or two ago.

Not a goose or a duck in sight right around here, however, and that had put the master hunter who walked down to watch the egrets come in with me last night in a bleak mood since the seasons open soon. Most likely they'll arrive soon. But for the moment, those of us who hunt sunflowers with cameras have the advantage.

Ancient Faces: Oh those Columbia girls!

A guy named Rick Maddy wandered into the LCGS library Thursday and I misheard his name as "Matty," which didn't mean a thing. Then "Maddy" dawned in one of those aha! moments and we were on common ground, although there haven't been many Maddy sightings in Lucas County lately.

Maddy used to be a tri-county name --- Pleasant Township in Lucas, Indiana and Washington townships in Marion and Cedar in Monroe --- all joining. Most of the remaining Maddys seem to have Albia addresses, however.

In any case, Rick's name brought this old photograph to mind, since the Ola Maddy in it was a friend of my grandmother. So I went home and got it so he could copy it although he didn't know offhand how Ola was related to him.

I have no idea why these seven young women were photographed together in Columbia, where they all lived, at some point before 1894 (Ola Maddy married John Stotts in that year). Could it be a graduation photo of some sort? The three young women in the front row appear to be holding what could be diplomas. And why are four of the women wearing some sort of ribbon device on their left shoulders?

These young and pretty Columbia girls from at least 115 years ago now, are (seated from left) Rachel May, Mag Askren and Adda McCorkle. Standing are (from left) Ola Maddy, Lula Flanagan, Eunice Caldwell and Jessie Brown (my grandmother). I'm guessing the photographer was Alpheus Elkanah Love, husband of my Great-aunt Laura (Prentiss) Love (Jessie's half-sister), but can't be sure of that because the card is not marked.

Although Rick hadn't lived in Iowa since he was about two --- his family moved to Washington --- there still were plenty of connections to make. I went to high school with his first cousin, for example, and know several of his Thorne cousins. Mumford was another old Lucas County name to which he had ties.

My buddy Darlene got Rick headed down the right track Thursday and I came in a little late, but it was a treat for both of us to be able to help him a little (and Betty Cross chimed in via telephone, too). I'll have more to say about Rick another time. But I've gotta tell you, if they'd run this guy up a flagpole, I'd salute!

Avian superlatives

Well the quality of the wildlife photography has not improved, but the wildlife has. A pair of great blue herons joined their cousins the great egrets at the marsh Wednesday evening, making it an even better show. The cormorants continue to host this avian reunion of the "greats." The big blues obviously were in charge, perched atop neighboring trees like the angels atop Charley Brown Christmas trees decorated with egrets.

There are always blue herons around the marsh, but whether these two are regulars or just passing through I can't say.

Watching the grass grow

There's so much to see this time of year as one season begins to slip into another that it's hard to know where to begin, but the monsoons have lifted and it's time to start figuring the beginning out.

Jerriann suprised me during a dose of dawn-breaking WHO weather by announcing that we need more rain. Not here, please; not for a while. That 5-7 inches last week was more than enough. Bill, driving up from Corydon for Bible study yesterday, concluded that we'd had so much rain that Wayne County had lost its footing in the mud and either slid farther south or stretched. That was the only explanation he could come up with for being late both on Sunday and on Tuesday while executing a drive made for years and heretofore timed perfectly.

I wish you could have been with me for the show near sunset yesterday down at the marsh as the cormorant regulars that roost in the dead trees opposite the observation deck were joined by snow-white guests, alternating black and white airships appearing from nowhere and from all directions, circling over the pond and coming in for landings. It was magic. (I also wish my camera had telephoto capabilities so that close-ups had been possible.)

It's also a great time of year to watch the grass grow, or rather the seedheads emerge on varieties of prairie grass that have been shooting up unobtrusively all summer and now are ready to put on their show.


Indian grass (above; that's a Union Pacific freight in the distance) is my favorite with its showy plumes. But big bluestem (below) comes in a close second. I have a big clump of indian grass in the back yard in town and confess to going out there now and then, sitting down and just looking at it. Can't do this for too long or the neighbors begin to wonder, but at the marsh there are no time limits.