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Oleson, Olsen, Olson Family Reunion Cemetery Tour
Have you ever gone on a cemetery tour? I’ve gone on several super informative and fun ones at the Forest Home Cemetery in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. So, I wondered about a family cemetery tour for a reunion. I did some research and found some articles about how to conduct a cemetery tour or a self-guided cemetery tour. First, I read “Creating Your Own Cemetery Tours: Find Your Ancestor’s Grave” by Lisa Lisson(https://lisalisson.com).
Lisa’s first step is to find the history of the cemetery where your ancestors are buried. Nineteen of my relatives are buried in the Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bay View neighborhood of Milwaukee, so I thought that would be a great cemetery to tour. I was unable to find much history online about Woodlawn Cemetery except that it was established in 1910 and was owned by the St. Lucas Lutheran Congregation. I had previously been to Woodlawn Cemetery many times checking out my ancestors’ graves. I checkedFindagrave.com and Billiongraves.com to see if I’d missed any relatives at Woodlawn and found some additional ancestors. Then, I made an appointment with Jackie Franecki, Family Services Counselor, at Woodlawn Cemetery to discuss my relatives’ graves and funeral planning. Jackie said she didn’t have any additional information about the history of Woodlawn Cemetery. However, she was extremely helpful in finding my ancestors’ grave site locations, xeroxing cemetery cards, and providing a map of the cemetery (which is helpful for planning a tour).
To find more history of Woodlawn Cemetery, I went to the Bay View Historical Society and searched their newsletter collection. I found “Woodlawn Cemetery,” an article written by my great uncle W. H. Oleson in the Bay View Historian. Then I went to the Milwaukee County Genealogical Society website to search their newsletters from 1969 to the present. It was a slow process because there is no easy way to search newsletters except to look at each one individually. I found “History of Woodlawn Cemetery” by Lois Molitor.
It pays to check your local genealogical or historical societies when looking for information. Be patient while looking for information because you never know what you’ll find. I also looked through my great grandfather Alfred Oleson’s papers and found The Equinox, an old newsletter with a short history “Woodlawn Cemetery becomes an Oak Street Property.” You never know what you’ll need to keep while doing genealogy research and when it will come in handy. All these sources helped me to compile a short history of Woodlawn Cemetery for my family reunion tour.
I had several photographs and information from previous research about my ancestors. I marked the sections on the map of the cemetery where my ancestors are buried and collected copies of cemetery cards which provided more information I can use in my tour. My first stop on the tour was Charles and Nellie Olson’s headstone (the cemetery card listed their names as Olsen, Olson, and Oleson), my 2x great grandparents located in Section 1. I have photographs of them which I included in the tour booklet. Later relatives changed the spelling of Olson to Oleson. Additional research has shown that Oleson can be spelled any which way and still be your family. Shared by Diane Olson Piedt, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Wallace “Wally” H. Oleson - Son of Hattie and Alfred Oleson - (1914-2006) Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Viola Stringer - Wife of Wally Oleson - (1916-1989). Both buried at Woodlawn Cemetery Raymond Oleson - Son of Hattie and Alfred Oleson - (1911-1968) He fell off the back porch of where he worked while smoking a cigarette. Coroner’s report at the Milwaukee Historical Society. Buried at Woodlawn Cemetery. Hazel Smith - wife of Raymond Oleson - (1916-2001)
Alfred Oleson - Son of Charles and Nellie - date of birth - 10 September 1879 in Illinois. Date of death - 15 February 1944. Hattie Golder Oleson, date of birth - 31 July 1886 in New York. Date of death - 28 December 1962 in Milwaukee. second wife of Alfred Oleson. Hattie and Alfred married on 1 July 1908 in Milwaukee. Hattie died at home. There is a coroner’s report at the Milwaukee Historical Society.
John Golder - Hattie’s father - (April 1861 in Germany - 1934 in Milwaukee) Louise Golder - Hattie’s mother - (March 1861 in Germany - 1938 in Milwaukee).
The International African American Museum (IAAM), in Charleston, South Carolina, will welcome visitors for opening weekend on January 21, 2023.
The museum will honor the untold story of the African American journey at one of America’s most sacred sites. It is located at the
International African American Museum in Charleston, South Carolina edge of Charleston Harbor on the former site of Gadsden’s Wharf – one of the nation’s most prolific slave trading ports – with a view of the Atlantic Ocean.
Visitors will have the opportunity to engage with authentic and lesser-known history through storytelling, compelling artifacts and exhibitions. Nine galleries range from introducing the African origins and diasporic connections of African Americans to revealing centuries of African American creative, political, and social contributions in American culture and history to taking an unvarnished look at slavery and enslaved people’s fight for human dignity.
Harvard professor and historian, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., notes that “48.1% of all the African slaves who came to the United States entered through Charleston. … I think it’s very important that a great city in the South be the home of a great museum celebrating the achievements, history, and culture of persons of African descent.” Gates helped shape the museum’s concept for the Center for Family History genealogy research library, a best-in-class genealogy library connected to the world’s largest genealogy databases, with a focus in developing expertise in African American ancestry research. Source: The International African American Museum, 14 Wharfside Street, Charleston, South Carolina https://iaamuseum.org.
