The Friends of Lone Fir is a non-profit, volunteer group who help maintain and educate folks about our wonderful local pioneer cemetery. They put on tours of the Women in Lone Fir, symbolism and architecture of tombstones, and headstone cleaning workshops.
And this year, the Friends hosted a five Saturday series of tours called Twilight Tombstones. On each Saturday in October and one in November, guides lead four groups of twenty through the cemetery, telling stories of the folks buried there.
It was sold out in minutes!
This year, Auntie Bridgett volunteered with me. She greeted folks at the gate and steered them in the right direction.
My job was “tour support”, which means I made sure our group, lead by Peregrine and Paul, stayed together. I also answered extra questions from the folks in the group. It was a delightful, educational, exhausting evening.
The fun began even before the tours started! A friendly group of Zombie Carolers came by after serenading the Dead, and shared their songbook with us. Their songs are not for the squeamish, featuring such delightfully gruesome tunes as “Rudolph the Undead Reindeer” and “Good King Wenceslas Tastes Great.”
I get to volunteer at the Lone Fir Cemetery again! This year the event is called Tombstone Twilight, and will be held every Saturday in October from 4 to 7 in the evenings. (Buy tickets online at FriendsofLoneFirCemetery.com)
This should be an easier to manage, mostly-daylight activity, in contrast to last year’s event. The Tour of Untimely Departures was one, very long, very dark, evening.
I am looking forward to being part of the show, and this year, Auntie Bridgett is getting involved!
We met up with J Swofford and other volunteers at Lone Fir the other day, for a walk-through of the tour. We got to ‘meet’ such interesting folks as Julius Caesar, a formerly enslaved man who made a name for himself as a political orator for progressive causes. He was also a local baseball fan, and on his tombstone, along with his name and dates, are the words “Play Ball”.
Walking in Lone Fir always gives me peace and perspective, and learning about the lives and accomplishments of the folks there shows me the possibilities of the human spirit. (There are also a lot of cute squirrels.)
I will be making the walkabout a few more times before the tour, so I will not get lost escorting folks around, and I’ll tell you about it as it happens.
Well, I survived! Being a volunteer for the Friends of Lone FiR Cemetery’s Tour of Untimely Departures was the longest, most exhausting, and most rewarding days I have spent since my retirement from teaching.
During the set-up, my new-found friend volunteer Jennifer and I raked leaves from the ‘off-road’ routes for the North and South tours. Each tour is about a mile… so two miles for raking.
Here is Jennifer later, in her Tour Guide regalia. Isn’t she beautiful?
Then we set out the solar powered tiki torches that mark and illuminate each actor’s position. Two more miles. Then it was time to walk home for lunch, a change into costume, and a rest. Half a mile each way.
When I checked in for the Tour, J Swofford met the actors, tour guides and assorted helpers with pizzas, making sure we knew where to be and what to do. Folks practiced their lines and prepared for the long evening.
During the evening, I was a ghoul. This role calls for walking among the tours at a distance, keeping an eye out for stragglers and making sure actors have what they need. It allowed me to see the beautiful Line Fir Cemetery at sunset and twilight.
Part of my evening was spent at the Exit gate, directing people to the Entrance, answering questions, and stopping folks from sneaking in. Luckily, I had found a lovely stick, about six feet long, which became a handy, authority-lending staff.
At 10:00, when the last of the visitors had left and the exhausted actors headed off, I helped gather the luminaries and Auntie Bridgett and Grandpa Nelson came to walk me home.
I know you’ve always asked yourself, “What does one wear to spent a freezing Halloween night in a cemetery? Well, I will show you.
This weekend I volunteered at the Tour of Untimely Departures in Portland’s Lone Fir Cemetery. The skies were clear, but it was forecast to be in the low 40s…. So I knew I needed layers. Remember, these are not three separate outfits. This was all on me at the same time.
Layer #1. Long underwear and wooly socks.
Layer #2. Turtleneck sweater and jeans over the underwear.
Layer #3. Victorian blouse, vest, and skirt. This is the ‘costume’ part. The watch cap will save my ears!
Final ghoulish layer #4. Shroud-ish scarf and heavy black gloves. The little shoulder bag held energy bars to keep me fed for the six hour shift! My heavy Portland boots finished things off and kept my twinkle-toes warm.
And doesn’t Bridgett’s artwork make my face scary?
Out on a walk the other day, Auntie Bridgett and I enjoyed the cool Fall breezes and wafting leaves.
We also got that perspective that really looking at things gives. Near the SideStreet Arts Gallery, we saw this delightfully painted mailbox. It had a sweet, almost “Dora the Explorer” feeling.
We continued through the neighborhood to pay a seasonal visit to the Dead People at Lone Fir Cemetery. I have volunteered to help with this year’s Tour of Untimely Departures, a wonderfully eerie event put on by the Friends of Lone Fir, and I am very excited about it!
At this event, groups of guests are escorted through the cemetery, and actors playing some of the dearly departed stand by their headstones to tell the story of their life and death.
On our walk, I took the map of the tours and we walked around to see if we could find the graves. First on my list was Emma Merlotin, but I couldn’t find her, but Auntie Bridgett took this picture of the headstone ofAnneJean Tingry- Le Coz because of her French origins.
When we got home, Bridgett did some research on Miss Tingry-Le Coz on the Historic Oregonian website. It turns out that SHE was Emma Merlotin, the lady on our tour who I was looking for! Emma Merlotin was the name she used when she was working here in Portland, but after she was murdered, her friends chose to bury her under her real name.
As always with friends at Lone Fir, I was sorry for her death, especially after her short, difficult life. But I was happy to have found Miss Merlotin and be able to remember her.
Life is full of contrasts, and I am glad for them.
At the end of this month, I will volunteer to help the Lone Fir Cemetery with its Tour of Untimely Departures. And this week, we had our first walk-through. Our leaders of the day were Margaret and Katie.
These two fine ladies walked our group of about 20 volunteers around Lone Fir, explaining how the tour will work. We followed each of the two routes (called North and South) and stopped by each of the graves where an actor will play the person who untimely departed (that usually means they died young).
A few of the actors were with us, to get the feel of things and practice their speeches. The actress who plays Maude McCroskey even came in costume and make up! She told her sad tale of being murdered by her abusive ex-husband, and we were all sad. But then she got to the part where HE became the last person executed in Multnomah County.
On a lighter note, the woman portraying Chloe Connelly Boone Curry told the story of her life, more than her death. She was the great granddaughter of Daniel Boone and came west with her family as a young woman. She became the first teacher in Oregon outside the mission system. She had the perfect demeanor for a teacher… sweet, loving, and with an strong backbone. She reminded me a little bit of myself.
Four graves are visited on each tour, with lots of interesting stories in between. The afternoon walk-through went well, and I look forward to our dress rehearsal next week and then the main event on October 28!
P.S. I couldn’t resist this picture of Margaret and a fellow ghoul admiring a brand new headstone made for a recently-passed fellow. The etched portrait and the leaves are so colorful!
This afternoon Auntie Bridgett and I went for a walk to the Lone Fir Cemetery. We got sad news earlier this week, that the wonderful “Tour of Untimely Departures”, a rare night time, storied tour through our lovely pioneer cemetery, would not be held this year. It takes too much staff and too many resources. I am so glad we went last year or we would have missed it forever!
So we went to say hello to the dead people during the daytime. It was before dinner, and the sun was low, but still bright. I showed Auntie Bridgett where the sweet chestnut tree is, and while we were admiring the squirrels’ good work at cleaning out every single prickly shell, an elderly oriental man came by, gathering the horse chestnuts. He said they are good boiled or cooked over the grill, but I am still not convinced.
Giant spreading Chestnut tree
We wandered around, appreciating the stories the headstones tell. The art and symbols, some over 100 years old, are beautiful even in decay. Weeping willows show peaceful rest, a drape over a stone urn shows separation between the living and the dead. Clasped hands mean a final farewell.
There was a stone showing a couple, Doll and Elton Mack Phillips, with a charming line drawing of them between their names, with their “sunrise” and “sunset” dates. I would have liked to have known them, I think. They look like fun.
We saw a long narrow stone that had been there so long the letters were perfectly filled in with moss, but no dates or details. Just “Smallbone”. That will take some researching.
We saw the headstone of Victor Hugo O’Rourke, a cook in the 65th Regiment of the Coast Artillery Corps. He died in 1918. His name makes me think his mother was a French Literature teacher and his father an Irishman. But my imagination sometimes runs away with me.
And then this bronze marker caught our eye because it was so detailed and crowded with symbols. Mr. William Scott died in 1901 at the age of 46. According to his bronze marker, he was a Knight Templar. But the Knights Templar went inactive after most of them were massacred by Pope Clement V in 1312. On the other side of the marker was a large anchor and rope with a shield and the letters. A.O.U.W., which stand for The Ancient Order of United Workmen, a branch of the Masonic Organization. This man obviously had a full life and a community that must have mourned his passing.
As always, we came away from Lone Fir rested and with a sense of perspective that sometimes gets lost while staring at screens in research or learning to use new equipment. Knowing that we all will go someday allows us to see each day as a gift rather than a chore.
Things are really getting ready for Halloween up here! People are decorating their lawns and porches with graveyards, skeletons and big spiders. It is a nice blend of creepy and friendly….Not “Come get scared”, but “Come get scary with us!” The yards look good during the day, and I look forward to walking out after dark to see how they are lit up.
Front yard grave yard
Mr. and Mrs. James Stephens, who owned the cemetery first
Besides neighborhoods pretending to be graveyards, there is our actual graveyard, The Lone Fir Cemetery. They gave a delightful, strictly once a year after dark tour, called The Tour of Untimely Departures. A group of volunteers called The Friends of Lone Fir Cemetery put luminarias along the main roads of the cemetery and guide groups through, with people playing the deceased and telling us their stories of life and dead.
No one jumps out or tries to scare you, but the stories all ended badly, or they wouldn’t be on the tour….Untimely departures, in this case, means they died before their time.
Professor Van Allsburg
After visiting the dead folks at Lone Fir, we came home and got dressed up for a Halloween Party given by our friends, Jack and Verity. We were all professors: Grandpa Nelson was The Idea Guy, Doctor of Smartness; Auntie Bridgett was Dr. I.E. Plinth, history of art, from Slug University; I was Dr. Beverly Pilkey Van Allsburg, Professor of Kid Lit. At the party we met Beetlejuice, Arthur Dent and a random alien lady, Pocilanus Rex, demon pig god, and many more characters. It was great fun and we stayed very late.
Idea Guy
The next day we slept in because of our late night. But when I was ready to face the world, Auntie Katie called and suggested we meet at Mt. Tabor and go for a walk in the woods there. I took at #15 east and got off at exactly the opposite end of the park, so I had a good long walk before we got together, but the forest was so beautiful, I didn’t mind.
Dr. Plinth
When we met up we had a snack picnic under a laurel tree, found a drained reservoir and practiced our echos, and gathered rose hips and lemon balm for making tea. Then it was time to head home. We met up with Grandpa Nelson at Fifty Licks Ice Cream for a treat, then got home to watch the Astros win a game of the world series with a bunch of home runs.
Dear Liza 