Forgotten Lives

Evergreen Cemetery (Colorado Springs, Colorado), Philip Weidemaier (1862-1907), Mary L. Weidemaier (1867-1961), Glen E. Martin (1887-1971), Hazel W. Martin (1891-1970), and John M. Diebold (1909-1969) monument inscription. When most people walk through a cemetery, they see names and dates. Genealogists see questions. Recently, I found myself standing before the gravestone of Philip Weidemaier in Evergreen Cemetery in Colorado Springs. The stone appeared straightforward enough

In 1879, Charles Friskey was living in Colorado City when he died of typhoid fever. Like many genealogical questions, what seemed at first to be a straightforward search for a burial place has turned into something far more complex.

A message appeared in my Ancestry mailbox from a writer explaining that his great-grandfather, William Michael Ladney, was born in 1915 in Brooklyn, New York. His original surname was Ladkany.