A Rabbit's Tale- Cemetery Spotlight 3/1/2012

Where Strangers Rest

Oakwood Cemetery, Niagara Falls, New York

Michelle Ann Kratts

Once upon a time there was a cemetery in a city at the edge of the world…

Niagara Falls, New York, though perched on the brink of doom for thousands of years, is still here—alive and breathing. You can visit her and stand so close that her spray will cover you. You can feel her roar start in your ears, a hum, and end inside of your soul in a complete chorus of angels. It was said that the ancient Americans traveled here. They were the first tourists. They worshipped the Great Spirit at Niagara Falls. They were healed of ailments here. They buried their most precious dead on the island near the giant cataract. Tourists continue to flood her hotels and restaurants, her attractions. They come to her and fall in love. They find God. It is unlike any other place in the world. So many leave with a pocketful of memories to glance upon as the years go by…and then there are those who never leave at all. They stay. For little did they know that their trip had included a one way ticket to a little triangular shaped lot in the heart of Oakwood Cemetery, known simply as Strangers’ Rest. It is here, in Strangers’ Rest, where Niagara has kept up a love affair with her beloved tourist--the traveler, the stranger—for many, many years.

It is unknown precisely when Strangers’ Rest officially appeared at Niagara’s Oakwood Cemetery, however, the earliest maps from the 1850s, indeed, reveal it by name and location. Oakwood, in its entirety, was established in 1852 with land from the illustrious Porter family. The railroad and the burgeoning tourist situation had made it necessary to have a cemetery that was more conveniently tucked away at the outskirts of town. As a result all of the bodies and tombstones from the original burying grounds were removed to Oakwood. The process took six months time. Some of these early “re-burials” from the old burying grounds are now in the plot known as Strangers’ Rest.

Strangers’ Rest is my very favorite stop at Oakwood. There is no other place in the world that keeps such unusual company. Towards the back of the cemetery, it is arranged in a perfect triangle. Clumped together at the front are the most popular stops for the visitor. Possibly the oldest gravesite in Oakwood is located here. Beneath a half pipe style base, 15 year old John Rish eternally rests. Originally buried in 1803, Mr. Rish had been moved from the old burying ground near Fort Schlosser on Portage Road in the 1850s. Oakwood board member and historian , Pete Ames, believes that at one time the original tablet may have been cemented into the uniquely styled and inscribed base. In fact, he recently uncovered a photograph from the archives of the Oakwood Cemetery Association (circa 1938) which seems to reveal that this was the case. Unfortunately the tablet is now gone. Luckily, however, the base is inscribed and on a brisk day in January we certainly found the snow to be our friend as it deliciously filled in all the nooks and crannies to make for almost perfect transcribing.

Another interesting character in Strangers’ Rest is Francis Abbott, the “hermit of Niagara.” Abbott was an English gentleman who happened to visit Niagara in the 1820s and became so enamored that he decided he could never leave. He made himself a home in a remote location on Goat Island and lived in solitude for many years. No one knows exactly what happened, but his body was found by a fisherman at Fort Niagara a few years later. Local folklore insists that he had been bathing precariously close to the water’s edge and he may have been carried away. We will never know for sure. However, if you stop by his grave, you are welcome to ask him yourself.

Strangers’ Rest is home to the stunters and daredevils who thought they could challenge Niagara and win. Annie Edson Taylor, the very first person to survive going over the Falls in a barrel, died destitute in 1921 and trustees of the Oakwood Cemetery Association decided that it was necessary to donate a plot for such an historic woman’s final resting place. She rests among other men and women who had gained sudden notoriety after performing daredevil feats on the Niagara River. Captain Matthew Webb’s grave was probably the most popular site in Victorian times. Captain Webb, an English champion swimmer who had successfully accomplished the feat of swimming the English Channel in 1875, died while attempting to swim the Niagara rapids shortly after in 1883. Amidst a big dilemma as to what to do with his body, Webb’s young wife decided to keep him at Niagara. She purchased a special plot adjoining that of Francis Abbott’s. Many travelers included his grave and that of the other daredevils as a regular tourist stop. It became a part of the Niagara experience…to say prayers, to leave beautiful flowers; to stand in the presence of those brave souls who had challenged Niagara.

It is curious to note that this special plot belonging to the stunters and the daredevils is also home to one of the most beautiful souls to have ever stopped over in Niagara Falls. Miss Elizabeth Howe (1868-1922) came here from Massachusetts to find herself in a most unusual situation. She lived and worked among the immigrants whose numbers made Niagara Falls second only to New York City in the percentage of newcomers populating the state of New York. She loved her work even as it contributed to her poor health and eventually led to her death. A fervent champion of human rights, especially women’s rights, Miss Howe established the International Institute on Falls Street. She was responsible for helping thousands of immigrant women obtain American citizenship, learn English, find a job, and obtain counseling. Perhaps, her friends knew that she had a thing for the spirit of adventure or perhaps they knew she belonged with others who had fought against all odds. Regardless, her modest memorial has become one of our most treasured locations.
There are hundreds of others buried here, as well. Oakwood, itself, contains close to 20,000 residents. Some of the lesser known folks who call Strangers’ Rest their home have stories just as tragic. Perhaps the pretty little rows of children are the most heart wrenching. They stand small and sweet, and you stumble over them as if they are merely desks in a kindergarten class. Unkempt, forgotten children, they reach for you when you pass. Many of the names reflect a calico quilt of the various immigrant groups who moved into Niagara at the beginning of the 1900s. When a child died, these families could not afford a family plot, only a single plot, and so the little children came unto Strangers’ Rest, too. Perhaps, Miss Howe and the International Institute may have arranged for some of these immigrant burials.

Strangers’ Rest also contains the remains of the suicides, the unknowns, the “John Does,” the body parts that inevitably washed upon the shores of the Niagara, the murder victims and the victims of unsolved mysteries. There were no markers for these burials. Just a few short years after the First World War, members of the American Legion decided to help bury two anonymous bodies that had been retrieved from the Hydraulic canal basin. The owner of the Cobler Funeral Home, who took care of the unclaimed bodies, believed that it was quite possible that these men could have served their country in war and therefore deserved a special burial in the Strangers’ Rest, instead of the usual course of events which would have sent their bodies to the Potters Field in Lockport. And so to this day, somewhere in this soup of souls, rest two anonymous men—probably the victims of suicide or homicide. One, was described only as a “25-30 year old Italian in a dark blue suit, blue striped shirt, collar size 14 1/2, with the laundry mark “71” found on the collar.” He had a ticket in his pocket for a moonlight ride on Lake Erie. The other gentleman was described as a “Pole or Lithuanian…about 40…5 feet 7, light complexioned, with brown hair and gray eyes…and a laundry mark of “John” on the collar.” Each time I walk through Strangers’ Rest I can’t help but admit to myself there is something terribly romantic about these two men known to fate only by their sizes and the laundry marks on their collars.

Interestingly enough, mystery continues to surround Strangers’ Rest in Oakwood Cemetery. Recent research reveals that Strangers’ Rest may have originally stretched along the back of the cemetery, up to the boundary of one of the groves of oak trees that had at one time been present. On August 1, 1891, an anonymously written poem appeared in the Niagara Falls Gazette, that will forever remain in my memory. It seems that someone had visited Strangers’ Rest and had been so moved by the sight of a particular gravestone as to scratch out a lovely poem and publish it in the local newspaper.
“Her grave, with spreading briar is grown,
And moss the name o’er wends,
Upon the shattered fallen stone,
That tells of home and friends;
Are British hearts, so hard and cold
And dead to Love’s bequest,
That Valor’s child forgotten sleeps,
In Strangers’ Rest?

O, roll Niagara’s mighty wave,
Sing to her in her dreams,
With tears of spray bedew her grave,
And sunlight flood with beams;
O, birds at morn sing sweetly there,
Beside your happy rest,
And stars of night look kindly down,
In Strangers’ Rest”

The grave belonged to Mrs. Emily Helena Lodge, the wife of an Australian sea captain who happened to die of bilious fever at one of Niagara’s most magnificent hotels, the Cataract House. She was only 36 and merely visiting. Her grieving husband was forced to leave her here. He sent letters and money, had others care for her grave, and then, as in all things, she was forgotten…until now. On October 10, 2010, a group of us came together to honor Mrs. Lodge on the 146th anniversary of her death. It was a beautiful and crisp morning. We shared music and words and left flowers in her memory. It was a celebration special to those of us who live in this wonderful city so close to the falls. We do have a strange love affair with our travelers, our tourists. For we understand, that, in reality, we are all travelers and our trip in this world is merely a pass-thru on our way to other places. None of us really belong, anyhow. This special place known as Strangers’ Rest may have originally come about out of necessity, but it truly has become an undying symbol of the love and charity this city has for her tourists and for those who have been forgotten and neglected at Death’s very doorstep.

For more information on Oakwood Cemetery, simply visit their website:  www.oakwoodcemeteryniagara.com