Who’s Buried In George Richey’s Grave

BINKERD, RICHEY, RODER, THOMAS, TIPP

Posted By: JCGS Volunteer
Date: 3/13/2020 at 16:56:53

Features From Bygone Days by Rev. Bob Jones
Who’s Buried In George Richey’s Grave
Ruth Thomas (Richey) recently told of an account in the family history that makes for a bit of interesting reading.
I had asked if she knew the Willis’ & Jones…”I knew Pat well, she said quietly. They had moved onto the farm they had occupied many years in 1921…the Vanderkeif place. It was also called the old Eli Dotson farm.
It was then she related this bit of history. It was in about 1901 or 02 that her Grandfather’s sister lived in Parsons, Kansas. Her uncle, whom I believe was Jake Binkerd, was meeting or being met by someone at the Railroad Station. As passengers were coming off the train, a man fell dead as he stepped off. “Why that’s George Richey from Colfax. I know him.” They got the body ready and Jake brought it back.
Mrs. Frank Roder was a sister who lived in the west end of town. It was the custom to take a body to the home before the funeral or even for the funeral. Mrs. Richey kept looking at the body and saying “That’s not George”. This man had red hair and he did not have red hair. It was Garnett Tipp also sharing an opinion…she believed that was George, also. “But not mother” Ruth Thomas was to say.
So they buried the man in the family plot at McKeever Cemetery with all the family honors.
George Richey had a daughter who lived in Cedar Rapids at the time. A few months later, she was home alone when her did, George Richey, walked in…”Liked to scare her half to death” chuckled our story teller.
Who was the man in George Richey’s grave? “No one knows”, said Ruth, “Someone asked my mother if she thought it wasn’t awful that a stranger was in one of their lots?”
“No!” she answered, “The awful thing is that someone surely was waiting for him to come home and he never came.”
The man is still buried there…without a name. And Ruth said that today she doesn’t know just where and when Uncle George died.
Source: Colfax newspaper; July 6, 1978
(note: newspapers from 1906 are posted on JCGS)