Thursday, October 1, 2009

Wild Rose Historical Society- Cemetery Walk & Lunch

The Wild Rose Historical Society will hold a Cemetery Walk and Lunch on October 11, 2009. The Walk will be in the Oakhill Cemetery on River Street. The Lunch will be in Roberts Park at 12:30 PM. After the lunch, people will then go to the cemetery. A second walk will began at 2:30PM. The proceeds will be used to pay part of the cost of the new roof for the Elisha Stewart building. The cost of the walk together with the lunch is $20 and reservations are necessary so we have enough food. If you do just the walk the cost is $5 per person. Oakhill has fairly steep hills. You may want to bring a folding chair because each of the eleven people we are honoring have a story of about 5 minutes each.

The eleven people are all buried in Oakhill. They are in alphabetical order: Clarence Corning, Dr. Ben Fisher, Henry I Hart, Anna Hoaglin, William J Knights, Ernie Knoke, Leon "Specks" Murty, Maty Murty, James Patterson, John Protheroe and Dr. Arthur Stevens. Mr. Knights was a co-founder of the Gideons, Specks Murty helped capture Ed Gein, John Protheroe was village marshal when the Wild Rose robbers were captured, Henry Hart went to India and has a story, Mrs. Hoaglin was the first librarian, James Patterson served over 3 years in the Civil War, Ernie Knoke helped start the Wild Rose Skating shows in the 1940s & 50s, Maty Murty taught in at least 12 one room schools in the county, Clarence Corning delivered the mail for 39 years as well as directed the city band and played baseball, Dr Fisher was on the school board as well as a doctor and Dr. Stevens was the dentist whose office was over the Mercantile with the scary outside stairs.