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Feature Stories (Vol. 109 No. 38--9/19/2007)

Tombstone over 100 years old unearthed near water line break

By Caroline Downs

A children’s tombstone, apparently over a century old, was discovered during a water repair job last week causing speculation around town about its origin.

The granite grave marker, with the name Mary Cole carved on one side and Ruth Cole on the opposite side, was found about four feet below the soil’s surface between the two Cottonwood apartment buildings on 2nd Avenue.

City of Kenmare workers were searching for the source of a water leak and digging in the area when the marker was found.

Jim Geiger is a board member for Kenmare Housing Corporation, which manages the apartments, and was assisting with the project. "As we were digging, we ran into a hunk of concrete," he said. "We thought it was a survey marker at first."

Jeff Schweitzer, who was operating the backhoe, agreed with Geiger’s first impression. The location of the apartment buildings is the site of a former Kenmare lumberyard.

In the early 1900s, Percy Cole and John Fox partnered to organize several businesses in Kenmare, including a lumberyard, department store, bank, and a Ford sales and service garage.

A chunk of concrete could have been left behind from years of development. Schweitzer said he also dug up several rotted and charred boards in the same location.

However, as the muddy object dried, Geiger noticed lettering inscribed on one side and realized they had instead found a tombstone. "There were no bones," he said, "and no sign of a grave or coffin."

The men washed that side of the marker and read the following words: "Ruth Cole, Born Nov. 2 1898, Died Jan. 20 1899, ‘Tis Jesus speaks, I fold, says He, This lamb within my breast, Protection it shall find in me, In me be ever blest."

The group wondered aloud if the marker had belonged to the family of P.M. Cole, one of Kenmare’s first residents and businessmen.

As mud was cleaned from the grave stone, another inscription appeared on the opposite side: "Mary Florence Cole, Born Aug. 3 1901, Died Oct. 23, 1901, Hold her, O father in Thine arms, And let her henceforth be a messenger of love between our hearts and Thee."

The marker was also etched with a church building under a sunburst on a third side.

A search in the Lakeview Cemetery records revealed both girls were indeed the daughters of Percy M. and Jane (Millar) Cole. The couple had two sons listed, born in 1892 and 1896.

According to Pioneer Profiles, written by John Mogren, Percy Morton, or P.M., Cole came to this area in 1883, when he arrived in Burlington. He worked as the first deputy sheriff for Ward County and moved to Kenmare with his wife Jane in 1897. Mogren also listed a daughter Esther for the couple, but she is not included in the cemetery records for the Coles.

Cole built a general store in Kenmare in 1897 and then erected a second, larger building after the first store burned in the city’s fire of 1899. He operated the P.M. Cole Department Store until he sold it in the 1920s.

He was a business associate of John N. Fox, who arrived in Kenmare in 1901 to start a banking business. Cole was one of the incorporators of the Kenmare State Bank, which later became the Kenmare National Bank and then the First Kenmare National Bank.

Cole served as the first school district clerk for the Kenmare school board, beginning in 1897. He was mayor of Kenmare from 1910 to 1914, during which time the Kenmare City Hall was constructed. He represented his district as a Republican in the state legislature in 1903, and helped develop the Mouse River Park Chautauqua Association in 1911.

He died at his home in Kenmare in 1931, and his wife Jane died in 1941 in Long Beach, CA. According to city auditor Mary Brekhus, Cole purchased a plot in the original section of Lakeview Cemetery.

A visit to the site revealed a possible answer for the grave marker found in town: the Coles gave birth to a third girl who died in infancy, Helen in 1902, and a new marker was inscribed with all three names and years. The old tombstone, with two names, was taken back to town and perhaps stored at the lumberyard in Kenmare.

The discarded marker was given to the Pioneer Village by the city workers and Geiger. The men were relieved at the news the bodies were interred at the cemetery, and no gravesite had been disturbed.

Anyone with further information about the P.M. Cole family is asked to contact The Kenmare News or call Pioneer Village board member Cindy Rytter at 701-385-4248.