Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 26 February 1950 — Page 13

orter Willlam J, busiest man at 1 Clark, accused n elderly widow, tified yesterday ents of Clark's ded. While he

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3 |

z Section Two

— of those

—— Within

less

© water,

City Of The

~ Strawberry Hill and Laughter _ Gave Way fo Crown Hill, Quiet

(First in a Series)

"By VICTOR PETERSON MANY, MANY years ago laughing family groups

and star-crossed lovers frolicked up Strawberry Hill.

In winter they breasted the snow-covered wonderland, breath forming cotton puffs which blended with the linen white of the world around. Then before the feverish fingers of spring, winter became rivers snaking

down down the hill into the valley. Towering trees and

smaller sisters burst with bloom. Flowering crab, the frost of dogwood, the lovers’

blush of redbud made a painter's palette pale. The joyful, vibrant “people saw nature steady its whirling self as bril-

liant ‘summer sun knifed through leaf-laden trees to &plotch. the deep, green grass

with yellow,

~——And-tke—the onrushing —sea=

son sweeping into .the brilliance of fall to death in the first drab davs of a new winter. =o too. the people on the scene did change. Strawberry Hill lingers a memory today as do the names who went laughing carefree up its side. The hill itself remains. Tt is called Crown Hill-—the City of the Dead. _the protective _—ecorporate arms. of Indianapolis there lies this second city. its population of some 117,000 equals that of Ft. Wayne It is cheerful and it is cheerHs—misston—is—to—provide that final home that comes to all men. Separated by station in life, they Tlie shoulder to shoulder as one in common ground for death Knows not the saint and the harlot, the builder and the killer, the rich and the poor, color or creed.

” ” n PLANTED with the seed of life is the sced of death. In

~ School Desk, New K

It's "Jerry's desk" again .

Seiyic-minded oy! minade

some the second ved ripens early, in others late. Inevitably it bears fruit for all in eternity. It was this the 30 original corporators of . Crown Hill realized in 1563 as Greenlawn Cemetery, on the present site of Diamond Chain Co. Inc, filled to overflowing with Union and Confederate dead of the Civil War In #8350 ‘the struggling Hoo-" gsier- capital in the wilderness had a population estimated at S000. Ten years later more Than 18,000 made their homes here. ‘By mid-war years it had hecome a thriving city, bustling

with soldiers in eamp. caring

" for the wounded in hastily im-

provised prisoners thousands Knowledge of sanitation as practiced was limited by present standards. The swollen population brought deaths out of proportion and

men conceived

hospitals, who

guarding marched in by

medicine and

Crown Hill. Today its original 40 acres have expanded to 540. and it is the second largest cemetery in space in the nation.

Spring Grove:of Cincinnati exceeds it in size. It is, however. the “nation's

largest offering complete burial service of all races and creeds. Since inception there has been burial in the earth. Now there i= above ground entombment and soon space will be available for inurnment, the depositing of ashes after cremation.

Only :

cal Nr

SUNDAY,

he Indianapolis Ti

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A

VE ny WT RG

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| Editorials 1 Politi

FEBRUARY 26, 1950

Radio Tier realy - Movies

. via ae “sr 14 =

el BABE ELEN 15

verses il-2s Sports sees nn. .23-26

Place Where All Men Find Peace

Fs

Row on row of markers. for soldier dead stretch over gently sloping ground in Crown | Hill Cemetery toward the ivy-covered chapel. STRAWBERRY HILL, reach-

ing for the

heavens, was se-

lected the cemetery site because

it was the highest community. lies James Whitcomb Riley.

mit

Poet,

spot in the Today at ite sumburied the Hoosier

And spreading from the

slopes along 55 roads within five ing lie the thousa in this warld of their well within smart when

right country

the ci

niece 1 preg put

mieF of

miles of fené¢

ftv.

founded.

itten And

nds of

own

paved pubtte at frst wae about burving its others a remote spot for it lay 2 miles from town Now Dedication day, however was ‘a Tune 1. 1864, saw in the tend It also marked the The burial, that of Mrs. Lucy

apathetic dead in such

some 400 at

Seaton; 33=vear-olt wife of an Army captain. Many con demned him for burying his wife in the wilderness, and the

simple stone marker crested with a weeping willow expressed a bit this sentiment

Ai its base ‘apt. Beaton had inscribed { —“Pegr--Lttcy God grant tat I may meet you in Heaven.” The son of Frederick W. Chislett, first superintendent, has recalled in memoirs that “Crown Hill was then a wild, secluded place. Father would not open the door after dark to anyone and often had to drive some one

away at the point of his revolver, “Soldiers trom the camps were sometimes very trouble

some, and getting things out there in any sort of shape was a pretty hard proposition, . To go into the city was one hour's

drive down through the Fall Creek swamp.” Meridian St. was a narrow

country road, bordered: on each side with osage orange trees so large and bushy the branches brushed carriage wheels, Never theless, some 400 made the dedi catory trek. One of them, Mrs, Daniel Stewart, penned impres

stons ’ ~ ~ ~ “EVERYONE present had a _peranal intérest . It was an un usual gathering of old friends

and neighbors to view and se lect new grounds. for homes where they might stil near each other “After the service they tered about. i ‘groups over the beautiful’ undulating green acres and wooded lands All looked about them with

future

1 he

scat

slopes of

admiration, their faces bearing

an expression of uncertainty and hesitation, each wondering perhaps, which among them would be the first to find rest

there.” _ ~ LL Since then they and thousands of othérs have found

eterral rest at Crown Hill. As ina city of the living names stand out, but the great mass is made up of the “meek” whom the Scriptures say shall inherit the earth. If Poet Riley rose to stand hy the stately pillars of his monument shouldering the sky, he

some

would see the markers of Booth Tarkington and President Ben-

CJA HATTISON Just below, Fars

ther down the slope lies Mrs. Seaton, and stretcning in mute rows of simple stones of war dead toward the gray, stone tvy-cavered chapel built in 1875. The dead of all the nation’s wars are honored. Memorized in rock are the graves of three vice préstdents, numerous governors, senators and cabinet members including one whose body never arrived to occupy its mausoleum. There is the grave of the King of Patagonia, a Hoosier long lost to his native state, The final resting place of John Dillinger Jr., once the most sought criminal in the nation; still grows no grass along the edge because of visiting feet. n sn - AND THERE are stories gaThe horse which balked and refused to climb the hill, the cooked food upon the grave in place of flowers, the widow and widower whose Jove {flour neighboring graves,

lore

ished over

the bulldog -guards-—and April Fools’ Dav in the marble orchard of Mr. Graves

It has taken nearly 100 vears to huild this fabulous City of the Dead to its present stature as an institution in Indianapolis: life. It grows in population by some 1500 every veal with January through March the peak months, “By ship, by hy automobile come former Indianapolis residents. from over the world to their final rest, Fach year some 150 bodies are shipped in from out of state, most of them coming Florida and California“ where people have gone on retirement or to regain lost health.

It's a nation of a strange place, this City of the Dead, and it echoes almost silently

the quiet slip of the gravedigger's shovel in: the sod. (Tomorrow: Names awaken memories.)

that

. Someone else has been sitting in Jerry Dunaway's old desk in the

second grade in School 15. But now that there's a chance the little leukemia victim Ray be coming

back, the kids and teacher (left to right), Nancy Sutterfield, Kenneth Derringer,” Miss Carol Ramsey

“and Russell Hirschy, clean it out to have it ready and waiting for Jerry.

Hoosier Actor On Broadway Enjoys Change

James O’Rear- Tikes Comedy

rR

Meet Snicker .

. The biggest thing that's neighborhood kids since” Jerry went away is this new kitten, "Snickers." The Mack boys, Charles, Rural St: wrote to Jerry-about "Snicker." Here they ol ‘Snicker"

that Jerry’ $s coming home in a couple of weeks."

Parts After Stool Pigeon Stuff

By EARL WILSON, The Times’ Broadway Columnist

NEW YORK, Feb. 25 said James O'Rear, of 453 E.

“I was awfully tired. of being a rat,” Walnut. St.

Frankfort, Ind.

“And T-was tired of being a stool-pigeon and a killer, 160. It's nice to play comedy for a change.”

O’'Rear, one

stage—Will Geer and Ray Van comedy scenes in the new “Broadway, hit, “The Happy Time.”

We sat in his dressing room and .he told me, “I'm playing a naibe young boy—a character part, you can see-—who's never had a drink. He goes

to ask his girl's father for her '

hang.” “The ‘father’s an oid rumpot who keeps wine in the water cooler. “Well, the boys gets nervous and repeatedly fills his glass from the cooler, thinking it's Pretty soon he's stiff and has a wonderful drunk scene, “It's so nice for a change.” . ! ” » MAYBE you saw this Hoosier actor play a stool pigeon prisoner in “Brute Force.” and get pushed .under the hammer of a drop forge.

In “Criss Cross” he played a gangster. : “In that one, though.” he laughed, “1 was a blond gangster,

“Every two weeks I'd ‘go to the studio beauty parlor to get my hair touched up. There we'd git—-me and Doris Day and Diana Lynn and David Niven

- and Douglas Fairbanks—all -

-having our hair touched up’ “But maybe I shouldn't be telling you that”: ~~

of Frankfort's contributions to

“fifth ghade,

"to cpme Bast,”

the Broadway Sickle are others.

WILI, GEER'S mother Kate Geer, was O'Rear’s teacher in but he didn’t meet the actor until he was a student at “rankfort High School. “One. day I was summoned to the principal's office,” he recalled. “The principal was Kate Howard. She's a wonderful woman probably about 95 now. She used to be my-mothe 's teacher. “Well, in her office was this tall fellow with a skunk cabbage under one arm. It was Will Geer. He'd been touring with the famous Mrs, Fiske and had stopped off at home. He's quite a ‘botanist and had been walking in the woods. That's where he got the skunk cabbage, I suppose.” ({O'Rear’s too modest to mention it, but Geer told me once that what Kate: Howard said that day was, “Will, O'Rear will be on Broadway soon and you ight as well meet him now.”) : ” ” ” AFTER gfaduation the youthful actor put on plays in Frankfort “1 was trving to raise money he said. “I put on a play in the Presbyterian Church. I inveigled some local people to act in it. “Then I got grand ideas and rented the high . si 1 auditorium for $15 and put on ‘East Lynne. Oh, it was a superior productjon.

i# doing his =

James O'Reer . . . tired of being a 'rat.’

So We -carried scenery through

the streets, . period - clothes—anything

‘for

ransacked attics

to save” money.—One ‘of the

actresses

who's now Mrs, Robert Quick.

was

Rodzlie

She sent me a' wire night of this show.’

to join a stock “Massachusetis, ' n ~ ” “THAT brings said.” “I was in

walking down Park and I spotted Herbert

aren't you the former dent?’ and he said’ son.’

good to see you’

Shortly after that joined Orsen Wellies’

four movies.

ing room table. “Here's one Wess. fort.

in Chicago enough money to go.

“he’s managing a radio -in Phognix.

There was another

the show, It read: your drunk act. thirsty.” Irwin,

happened to the

10, and Stevie, 8, of 844 N.

—Got Tired of —— Being a ‘Rat’

opening

O’'Rear._raised enough money company

us to 1935.” New 'Y broke and without a job

We were on the narrow island and both had to stop. 1 said ‘How do you do, si

‘Yes,

“I said ‘Do vou know where 1 can get a jon? He said ‘It was and brushed right by me and that. was that.”

Mercury Theater, and left it to go into the Army. Upon discharge he went ta Hollywood and This is his Broadway role since then

HE SHOWED me some of the wires and letters on his dress-

from Norman I knew him in FrankOnce I won a" scholarship to the Goodman. Theater School and didn't

the scholarship to Wess.

“And ' here's “one. from Frankfort girl.« Mrs mn’ Arledge. She's in Albuquerque.’

from some friends who'd seen “We loved ‘It made ‘us all.

: I guess that's: the greatest praise you can pay an actor.

Rehearsal .

Eastern Ave. when their little playmate comes home from New York.

Photos by Be

ih Wallace, Times Staff Photographe

. This_is how the kids in Jerry Dunaway's neighborhood plan to line his steps at 835

If all. goes well, the little in-

curably ill boy who left on a stretcher will be coming up these sfeps under his own povier. Not right

away ‘but-in-two more weeks. -

Hope to Save Grand

Canoe transportation is the best mode of travel in the swamp areas of the Kankakee River now being

Kankakee Swamp

developed as a state park and forest.

Only Small

Portion Remains WANDERING forest of

industrial Indiana is the of the Kankakee River

Todav “hut a small portion of the once great wildlife refug€ remains The swamp 1and of the oxbows and bayou has. heen drained to give firm :

footing for buildings giant firms. From just County line,

insjde the however,

and Newton Counties,

a wilderness,

It is this that conservation

through the northwest Grand Marsh

housing

Porter and slipping down to divide Lake the "historic Kankakee flows through

ists, hunters and fisherman hope to. retain by creating another state park and forest. Presently the Indiana Department of Conservation is deep in plans for development of the area under mandate from

the<1947 General -Assembly But veteran conservationists shake their heads. It won't.’

follow the pattern of the other 15 state parks. It can't, for very little of the land is out of water the year around. o oa. 8 MOST of it is in marsh, much of the rest, subject to flooding. - Establishment’ of a state park, however, would guarantee the preservation of topography: peculiar to the area. It also would aid in restoring to wildlife a refuge, the loss of

a

which ‘nas driven fowl:and furbearing animals elsewhere. ‘It will be veara before, the project is completed at a cost estimated greater than $300.000. Currently the department is securing land bordering the Kankakee. Some 1400 acres alréady have been acquired either through gifts ore purchase About Hoo more are needed to round out the park area, but a minimum of 100 separate lawsuits are envisioned incthe acquisition of land by condemnation. Unless much of this is settled out of court, it may take 10 years-to get out of the legal swamp. - The Kankakee State Par’. | and Forest still is a -SPoEtg. max's dream. pit

“plane, by train,

from 5