In our initial story, we learned the first semi-official Lansing cemetery is the current 1200 block of Turner Street in Old Town. The second graveyard is now two commercial blocks south of Saginaw east of Cedar. The third property mentioned in last week’s installment is the current Oak Park on Lansing’s east side.
It was deeded by the Seymour brothers to the town of Lansing December 1, 1851 and recorded November 9, 1852. No explanation is given why it took 11 months to file the paperwork. In Cowles’ account, he merges the second and third cemeteries as a single unit. Oak Park served as the town’s (then the city’s) burying ground for more than 20 years.
St. Joseph Catholic Cemetery, formerly St. Mary’s, on West Willow was founded in 1865.
In 1869 the city decided a larger expanse was needed to accommodate the growing cadaverous population. Durant explains “after a careful examination of several localities†the 80-acre farm of John and Rebecca Miller was purchased May 6, 1873 for $8,000. This new cemetery, Mt. Hope, still serves the good people of Ingham County.
Upon the opening of Mt. Hope in 1874, Oak Park ceased burials. Ownership of unoccupied, but purchased, lots was transferred to Mt. Hope and re-internment began. By most accounts it was not completed until 1880. However, sources, Cowles and LSJ articles cite a failure to remove all bodies.
[/caption]Long-time Lansing Parks Superintendent H. Lee Bancroft is quoted in a 1953 article stating “[I}n 1902 there were still burials that had not been transferred.†He recounts as a child seeing a workman nonchalantly “throwing†half a skeleton and skull from a grave stating “Nother dead ‘un!â€. After becoming a park in 1900, a small lake was excavated on the north end and fountains installed. In his 1949 article Story of Parks and Cemeteries, he describes children wading into “the deep muck of the lake.†Unfortunately the fountains were too much temptation for children who dove “into the dirty or mucky water and the fountains had to be removed.â€
Clarification: The railroad mentioned in the first installment, which bisected the properties east of Larch happened in 1863, a decade after the purchase of the Oak Park location by the city, not the state donation of lots in 1848.
Next week’s Lost Lansing will complete the story of early Lansing cemeteries. We will visit the grave of an unknown Fire Fighter, experience African American Civil War veterans receiving their official markers after a hundred years and find out that the most recent Lansing cemetery might really be the oldest.
Sources Consulted:
Past and Present of the City of Lansing by Albert Cowles
History of Ingham and Eaton Counties by Samuel Durant
Lansing Republican (August 8, 1878)
Lansing State Journal April 17, 1949)
Lansing State Journal (August 9, 1953)
1859 Topographical Map of Ingham County
Story of Parks and Cemeteries by H. Lee Bancroft Superintendent of Lansing Parks 1949
A Sesquicentennial Guide Book of the Railroads of Lansing & Ingham County From 1862 to 1987 by Henry A Reniger , Jr
Haughewoet and Sons Grocery, 213 Turner Street, 1888: my great-grandmother made a scrapbook and dated it, thank goodness, to 1888. There’s an advertisement/postcard which seems to read Haughewoet and Sons Groceries and Crockery, address 213 Turner Street, Lansing, Michigan. I’m trying to figure out where that addess was/is compared to Old Town now. Maybe the street numbers were re-configured. Do you have any information on this sort of thing? You can see it, I posted it, and some other beautiful pages, on flickr.com and I am rockwell2225. My great-greatgrandfather, Charles Martin Rockwell was one of the pioneers of Olive Township, Clinton County, in the 1860′s
…I’m also trying to figure out where Langer Hospital was in 1926 Lansing. My grandfather, on the Courtland side, was treated there, or died there. Do you have any idea how I can trace that? The building was still there when I was a child, around 1960, I remember it as a big, old mansion.
…don’t know if you’ll get this message, but hope to hear from you, it would be great.
According to city directories and federal census records the name was spelled Haughawout and the address was 713 Turner. The owners were Charles and Sarah.
In the 1883 Lansing City Directory it is listed as “C Haughawout & Son”
Street addresses have changed; in some locations more than once. The 1913 Sanborn Fire Insurance map shows both the old and the new addresses. C Haughawout & Son was at what is now 1213 Turner. The building still stands. It is directly across the street from where the first graveyard stood. The cemetery was already defunct by the time the grocery opened.
The Dr. RJ Lange Sanitarium (probably focusing on tuberculosis) was at 101 e Willow, on the river and only a few blocks from the grocery.