An undertaker's lament

Edmund B. Bradrick may not have been Chariton's first undertaker, but he surely was among the most enduring. 

Arriving in Chariton from his native Ohio with wife, Mary, during 1857, it was Mr. Bradrick who handled the arrangements for Sheriff Gaylord Lyman, fatally wounded in the streets of Chariton on July 6, 1870 (there's no record of who handled the arrangements for his killer, lynched that evening).

And it was Mr. Bradrick who buried, then reburied, Maggie Corbett, after her remains were snatched from their resting place on Oct. 30, 1887, at the behest of a medical student, and shipped to Des Moines.

And these were just two among hundreds.

During the 1880s, Edmund was joined in the family business of undertaking and carpentry by his son, Calvin, and they made a number of improvements to their parlor and woodworking shop, located in an earlier building on the Ameriprise Financial site on North Main.

Personal sorrows entered the picture during 1890 when his son and business partner died at the age of 30 of tuberculosis, leaving the senior member of the firm --- then nearing 60 --- on his own again.

That's a little of the background behind the small advertisement, almost a lament, that he caused to be published in Chariton newspapers as 1893 dawned:

+++

CHARITON, IOWA, JANUARY 3rd, 1893

Editor Patriot --- I have now been handling the dead of Chariton and vicinity for more than thirty years --- with what success I leave those I have served to judge. The question now is --- shall I be sustained? Many times I have labored hard while others have slept and taken ease and comfort, and I have been faithful to the trust you have committed to my care.

To those who have patronized me on account of loved ones gone, I would say I sympathize with you in your bereavement and thank you kindly for your patronage. Those who have never lost a dear friend, I congratulate upon your good fortune, but this will not always be so --- death enters and there is no defense. His time of coming none can tell.

My hearse is now nicely refit and my stock of funeral supplies is full and complete, consisting of a full line of varnished and cloth covered coffins and caskets, robes, linings, shoes, slippers and hardwares --- all from the best houses in the land.

My residence is on the second block east of the M.E. church. When not in my office call at my house day or night. It will pay you now and don't you forget it. Be careful where your leave your orders for burial goods.

E. BRADRICK

Funeral Director

Chariton, Ia.

+++

Mr. Bradrick did continue in the business for a few years after than, but Chariton Cemetery records suggest that he retired during 1901, leaving the field open to the Melvilles, his long-time competitors. They handled the arrangement for his wife, Mary, when she died during 1904.

Edmund lived until July 31, 1920, when he died at the home of his only surviving child, Lydia Temple, at the age of 87. 

He was buried beside his wife and children in the Chariton Cemetery but a tombstone never was erected, so the grave of this venerable undertaker is unmarked. Sam Beardsley, the new boy in town at the time, handled the arrangements.