I posted this somewhere else earlier.

My admiin at work is a former Marine and so is her husband, who also works at the center. He talked me into helping out a Eagle Scout work project geolocating and photoing U.S. veteran grave sites in Sioux Falls cemeteries. Being an Eagle Scout from long ago and being involved in Scouting leadership while my boys were younger and even after they left Scouting, I said sure.

I wanted some action at Mount Pleasant Cemetery (one, if not the oldest active cemeteries in the city) but the shift I signed up was in late morning so by the time I arrived, almost all the work done was there. I did take about a dozen or so headstone photos that people had "flagged" with little wire and bright orange piece of plastic head. The oldest grave I took at Mount Pleasant was the Civil War veteran who had died in 1913. Sadly, it was barely readable as the old marble has been eaten away from acidity in the atmosphere.

People moved on to Woodlawn Cemetery, which most Patrick Henry junior high and Lincoln High School alums know well seeing it on a regular basis while attending school. I probably should have known that Woodlawn would be more work because it's a larger cemetery than Mount Pleasant and more active. I tried to find my father-in-law's grave because there would be no information of his Navy service on it but couldn't find it for now, but that brought me down to the south end of the cemetery so I decided to take a parcel that I didn't think had been done yet. Most of the graves there were probably 20 year or less old.

Some of the volunteers just walked around their sections and took the geolocated photos but to my "systematic" scientific reasoning, that allowed too much room for error in missing a veteran's location so I marked each one I found with a orange flag. I started with a bundle of 100 flags and counted what I had left over when I was done, I had marked just shy of 60 graves. It had taken me a good hour+ plus to walk the parcel, looking at both the front and back sides of the stones or plaques and I was warm and my sandal-ed (good ones but still sandals) feet were barking.

Of the almost 60 graves I found, there must have been 10 or more that were E5s in rank during WWII, Korea, or Vietnam. That choked me up some because Paratroop Kid is a E5. I found actually very few officers, although did find one who had risen to Brig General in the Air Force or Air Guard. I went back up to where the Scouts were coordinating things and got some help to do the photo taking and with 3 additional people, I think we had them all captured with the photos within 15 minutes. I also found a number of grave sites of neighbors that I knew growing up and one of my wife's best friends who recently died of pancreatic cancer. I think the wife and I will go back there sometime soon and I'll show her friend's grave and go find my father-in-law's as well. I'll get that one added to the database at a later date. Here's a little news video from Friday night, I saw another KELO gal there at Mount Pleasant when I got there this morning, she looked a little warm in her makeup....

https://www.keloland.com/news/local-news/how-you-can-help-document-veteran-headstones/

You can search cemeteries quickly on www.familysearch.org

Mount Pleasant Cemetery
Artesian, Sanborn, South Dakota, United States:

https://www.familysearch.org/en/cemeteries/sites/218241/mount-pleasant-cemetery

It lists 1177 people buried in the cemetery.

I think this link will work for you, but you may have to become a member. It's free to join and they don't try to sell you anything

Keith

You can search the military status by clicking on the links with the names.

Familysearch is connected to all the major grave sights I know of.

I hope you are able to help honor our veterans. They deserve to be honored.

Keith

Keith C- Thanks for the info, I'll have to check it out!!

P.S. Wrong Mount Pleasant Cemetery. Artesian, SD is just a tad bit smaller than Sioux Falls

P.S.S. Sanborn County, SD is known for its "Forrestburg" melons. As a fruit raising guy, I thought you might find that interesting...

You're welcome.

Mount Pleasant Cemetery is one of the more common names of cemeteries. I just guessed which one was right. It's good to do what you are doing.

Keith

Is this the correct cemetery?

https://www.familysearch.org/en/cemeteries/sites/163852/mount-pleasant-cemetery

I have 5 relatives buried there.

"You have 5 relatives connected to this location!


Add Person
My 2nd cousin five times removed
Mathilda Jane Williams
Female
1839-1907 (Age 68)
•
KHN2-B5M
PERSON
ADD GRAVESITE
My 3rd cousin four times removed
George J. Willits
Male
1851-1892 (Age 41)
•
9J4W-ZCG
PERSON
VIEW GRAVESITE
My 3rd cousin four times removed
Harvey E Sawyer
Male
1859-1938 (Age 79)
•
KHY3-ZK3
PERSON
ADD GRAVESITE
My 3rd cousin four times removed
Matilda Jane " Jennie" Sawyer
Female
1861-1933 (Age 72)
•
K2F1-YC4
PERSON
ADD GRAVESITE
My 3rd cousin five times removed
Albert B Canaday
Male
1854-1938 (Age 84)
•
29QF-PKY"

Keith

My 3rd cousin four times removed Harvey E. Sawyer is one of the Civil War era soldiers buried there.

"Harvey E Sawyer
Male
10 April 1859 – 4 December 1938
•
KHY3-ZK3

Military Service • 0 Sources
from 1862 to 1910
Big Creek Township, Black Hawk, Iowa, United States"

Keith

He joined the military when he was 3 years old? lol

1862 to 1910 is the range of the records from the Big Creek Township, Iowa records. Nobody has probably served 48 years in the military either. I used the word era, not war. He wasn't enlisted until after the war. The Civil War Era refers to slightly before the Civil War, during the build up, through the Northern Occupation and reconstruction of the South after the War. The North had troops stationed in the South until 1885.

Keith

Most of the East River South Dakota counties got set up by Yankees from further east. However, most of the rural land was homesteaded by European immigrants. How many of the old Yankee families stuck around and died here is something that people would have to research. Most common surnames around here, at least through now, are Scandinavian and German ancestry, with a smattering of Dutch, Czech, Irish, and English.

Many of the early settlers of Ohio were American Revolutionary War soldiers and their families, who were given land in payment for fighting. Many were first given land in West Virginia and Kentucky and then moved to Ohio, when it opened up for settlement, because the land was better and transportation of crops to market was easier.

8 of my many great grandfathers, who got land that way came out of just North Carolina. I had 14 many great grandfathers fight in the battles of New Garden and Guilford Courthouse in North Carolina. 27 of the families I am descended from moved to Ohio between the Revolutionary War and around 1800.

4 of those families later moved to Iowa and then back to Ohio.

Almost everywhere they stopped, some family members stayed.

North Carolina got people from all of the then colonies, after the French and Indian War, because veterans were given land in exchange for two peppercorns, to be paid annually at a veterans party at a tavern, only if asked for. The payment of the 2 peppercorns is actually written in my many great grandfathers' land grants.

I find the early migrations of people fascinating.

When and where did your family come NonPCfed?

Keith