Tombstone Tuesday--Copemish Cemetery

Several years ago, one of my cousins on my mothers side of the family wanted me to show her some of the family stones that I had found.  We made a day of it, first hitting up the two cemeteries in Chester township, Ottawa county Michigan that had some family members.  Then we hit the road northward and I shared the stones in Chase township,  Lake county. 
After the work of once again digging weeds and grass that threatened to cover the stones there, we set our sights on new graves.  We ventured north even farther, trying to find Copemish cemetery in Cleon township, Manistee county, with some of our grandmother's line of Stiver, Wells and maybe even Nolf. 
Finally finding the cemetery, we discovered it had a section on both the north and south sides of the road.  And, deciding the north side looked older, as well as smaller, we drove in there and got ready to search.  We had already decided to make a very systematic search, starting and on side of the drive near the front and working our way around the entire cemetery.
When we parked our car, before we were even out of the car we saw this:

Two Stiver monuments!  One in granite and one in zinc.  A double header!  Whoo hoo! 

 This was the first time I had really examined a zinc monument in detail.  But as clear as if it had been set up last year instead of over a century ago, here was the info for Great-great-grandpa Jonathan Stiver.  Of course GGgrandma Maria's info was missing, but then she did die about 5 years later so the monument probably was in place before she died, and never updated.

 This stone, however, while massive and easy to read, was not so helpful.  No other names on it, it was apparently just the family marker.  It was surrounded by lots of other stones bearing the Stiver name.

This marker alone was enough to make the extra miles worth the trip.  But we wanted to try to find the Wells and Nolfs.  So slowly we progressed around the rest of the cemetery.
Then finally, after almost completing the cemetery, the other set of inlaws.  Great-great grandpa Peter D Wells and his wife Mary, who was a Nolf.

 And nearby, at least one Nolf stone, although again, only a family marker.

Pictures were snapped,

and poses were made.

All in all, a couple of very happy genealogists and cemetery hoppers started for home that afternoon.

Intro to Me

I’m Linda, the quiet and shy snow-loving member of our twosome. I’m married to a farmer who has never lived more than half a mile from where we now live. I have two grown sons, both farmers through and through. While I have moved around some, I have stayed in the West Michigan area all my life. My love of family history began with my grandmother telling me stories of how we were related to Ethan Allen (un-proven as yet) and how Gerald Ford used to attend our Ford family reunions as a child. Much work had been done on my father’s family history, so my first breakthrough came when I discovered my first Civil War ancestor on my mother’s side. It has been an exciting quest to dig into the Allen, Ford, Cross, Samis, Gilbert, Cunningham, Wells, Stiver, Hagen, and Walsworth lines. (Just to name a few.)
One of my biggest college regrets was that I decided not to pursue a history minor. Digging into the family history as well as the area history has been never-ending and rewarding adventure.