A High Tourch Profession

A High-Touch Profession

Lawrence’s two revered funeral homes, with 220 years of service between them, have weathered the COVID-19 storm by staying true to their purpose and to the families they serve.

by Bob Luder, photos by Steven Hertzog

The role of funeral director can be challenging, even during the most typical of times. It involves nearly daily interaction, counseling and planning with families going through one of the most difficult and heart-wrenching phases of life: grieving and coming to terms with the loss of a loved one.

Oftentimes, family members come into a funeral home not knowing what to expect, what to ask for, what it is they want. Other times, there are disagreements within families about what arrangements they want. A good, capable funeral director aids these families by wearing a variety of proverbial hats—event planner, counselor, arbitrator and then some. Now throw in a global pandemic of a highly infectious and potentially deadly disease, one which has forced state governments to impose strict restrictions, banning large gatherings of people and setting forth guidelines for social distancing and mask wearing, and well, it makes the function of the funeral home all the more interesting. The novel coronavirus—officially tabbed COVID-19—has thrown Lawrence, the state, the country and the world into a tailspin, and like any other business, funeral homes have been affected. “It’s a difficult time already,” says Audrey Bell, funeral director at Warren-McElwain Mortuary & Cremation Services. “To put COVID-19 on top of that, it just adds to the difficulty. There are just a lot of what-ifs right now that make it all more difficult.”

Background: A Local church streams a Rumsey-Yost Funeral service to those who cannot attend in person due to capacity guidelines at the funeral home. Left: Rumsey-Yost funeral director Todd Miller helps a guest with his tie. Below: Bart Yost hands out programs to arriving guests, as Todd sets up his camera to stream the service to the church.

Mourners listen to the eulogy at Warren-McElwain Mortuary & Cremation Services

Fortunately for the city of Lawrence, it has two funeral home/mortuaries that stand amongst the most venerable and long-standing businesses in the area. Rumsey-Yost Funeral Home & Crematory Inc. and Warren-McElwain Mortuary & Cremation Services have a combined 220 years of service in the Lawrence area between them. Rumsey-Yost began doing business in Lawrence in 1920, when Charles Rumsey and two of his brothers moved the Rumsey Brothers Funeral Home from its home of the previous four years, Tonganoxie. Warren-McElwain also traces its roots back to the early 1900s with the Schubert Funeral Home in Eudora (founded in 1904) and the Funk Mortuary in Lawrence (1909). The two merged into what would become Warren-McElwain in 1953. It adds up to more than two centuries of experience and service leading families through grieving and end-of-life processes. Funeral homes offer services that most might not ever consider until they need it. But most families do require it at some point in their lives. And the combined experience of the ownership and staff at Rumsey-Yost and Warren-McElwain, both companies of long and rich family lineage, ensures customers that they know how to do the job right—pandemic or no pandemic. “I’d say (the COVID-19 pandemic) has affected business negatively,” says Bart Yost, owner of Rumsey-Yost. “A lot of people are doing less, or postponing. And realistically, probably 80 percent of those who postpone will end up doing nothing.” “But so far, everybody’s been great about it,” Yost says of his customers adjusting to the age of the new coronavirus and all the extra safety protocols that come with it. “They understand. In that way, we’ve been very lucky about it.” And Lawrence is lucky to have Rumsey-Yost and WarrenMcElwain to produce and coordinate funeral services and burials.

Veteran Businesses at Work

After Charles Rumsey sold his interest in Tonganoxie and went into business with his two sons, what would become Rumsey-Yost moved to its current location at 601 Indiana St. in 1931. The sons took over the funeral home in 1951 upon Charles’ death and operated it until 1978, when they sold it to Alfred and Freda Ann “Shorty” Yost and Fred and Virginia Thompson. The Yost family became sole owners in 1986 and, today, Al’s and Shorty’s son, Bart, owns the business with his wife, Georgette.

“I worked at the funeral home since I was a boy,” Yost says. “Back in 1980, I was working nights there. I’ve seen the business go through a lot of changes over the years.” Warren-McElwain also has weathered changes in the funeral business and, like Rumsey-Yost, has weathered them well. The original merger between the Schubert and Funk mortuaries formed Cooper & Warren until 1968, when Bill Warren purchased Fred Cooper’s interest. Around that time, a young University of Kansas student by the name of Larry McElwain began working as a night attendant. Three years after the business moved to its current location of 120 West 13th St. in 1971, McElwain and his father bought the funeral home. McElwain sold Warren-McElwain to Jim Larkin in 2013 but remains with the business to this day as a funeral director. “Larry McElwain always said, ‘We’re in a high-touch profession’,” says Lisa Manley, funeral director who’s been with Warren-McElwain the last 19 years. “That’s how we treat everything we do here.” Both funeral homes provide a full range of services, including funeral services adapted to wide varieties of religions, burial, in-house cremation facilities, entombment, body donation and monuments. They also sell wide varieties of caskets, urns and cremation jewelry.

TRANSFORMING IDEAS INTO COMMERCE

Facilities Guidance Connections

Lisa Manley & Audrey Bell, Funeral Directors at Warren-McElwain.

A sitting area and mourners standing at Warren-McElwain

Each has the facilities and means to give attention to the smallest of details and craft clients’ ideas and visions into fitting life tributes. As Larry McElwain’s favorite phrase alludes, however, funeral homes are all about working with and understanding people. “Families come in and don’t really know what they want,” Yost says. “Most of my job is to just sit and listen. I give them ideas, options. Eventually, we settle on something and go with that.” He explains that about 75 percent of services are done at Rumsey-Yost. That number is less at Warren-McElwain, where the chapels (one in Lawrence, another in Eudora) are smaller and used mostly for visitations. Otherwise, both funeral homes coordinate with churches or private homes should families want them to host services. Both Yost and Warren-McElwain’s Bell agree the greatest change in the business in recent years is a sharp rise in requests for cremation. What used to be a relatively small percentage of cremations today is far above the U.S. average of 50 percent, they say. “We put in our own crematory in 1997,” Yost says. We were making six to seven trips a week to Kansas City. And once we dropped off a body, we didn’t know what happens after that. For our own liability purposes and peace of mind, we put in our own crematorium.” Warren-McElwain has its crematorium in Eudora at its own location.

Altered States

While an increase in cremations might be the most prominent change in the funeral home business over the last several years, there have been many more alterations to the way business is conducted during the past several months. COVID-19 began changing the way the world’s human behavior patterns back in midMarch, and things haven’t been the same since for most businesses, funeral homes included. “We’ve been doing more live funerals online,” Yost says. “Today, with all the restrictions … it just makes more sense to set up a service online.”

That, Yost says, puts an even greater premium on the creation of pictorial or moving slide shows commemorating the lives of lost loved ones, as well as choreography of favorite pieces of music. “We’ve just been going with the state’s recommended guidelines,” he continues. “At first, there could only be 10 people in the chapel at once. So there were services where even not all family could attend. We’ve just been working with families. Most have been understanding. The online services have helped a lot. “Now, the number is up to 45. We go in and sanitize everything before families come in. Everyone wears masks. For arrangements, we’ve moved into a much bigger room to accommodate social distancing.” Though Warren-McElwain’s building has been limited to 45 people at a time, and visitations have had to be spaced out over a greater time window to allow more guests to come through, Bell says the mortuary’s business has remained steady over the course of the pandemic. “There have been a lot of differences,” Warren-McElwain’s Manley says. “A lot of people are putting off services or waiting until family can gather safely. We’ve been doing a lot more graveside services with social distancing.” Warren-McElwain also has installed an FM transmitter so visitors can sit in their cars in the parking lot and listen live as a service is conducted. A speaker has been mounted outside the building so people can adequately social distance and listen outside should they choose. Warren-McElwain and Rumsey-Yost have thus far weathered the coronavirus storm by being creative and adaptive, and using existing technologies to continue servicing their clientele as only they can. That’s not to say recent months haven’t been difficult. But perseverance and continued commitment to excellence will win out in the long run. “Some of the saddest things I’ve heard have been about people wanting to make videos or other types of memorials, but they couldn’t even get into nursing homes to collect photos or other mementos,” Bell says. “People just haven’t been able to be with their loved ones at the end, and that’s sad. “Some of our part-time staff are retired, and a lot of them have been staying home,” she continues. “We’ve been running the business with full-time staff and some of our younger part-timers. One thing I’m most proud of is that, since the coronavirus hit, we’ve reported to work every day. We never closed. We’ve just kept working with families however they’ve felt most comfortable.” p

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