MEMORIAL DAY

When we were kids, Steve and Betty would take us to visit family graves in Corpus Christi Cemetery in Fort Dodge. We would go first to Becker Florist to buy geraniums to be used to decorate the graves. Dad would also buy tomato plants to put in the garden at home. It was fun for us to wander around the greenhouses and see the exotic greenery and take in the rich smell of soil, fertilizer and plants.

At each grave we would plant one or two geraniums using a small garden trowel that Betty had brought along.  We would make the sign of the cross, bow our heads and say a brief prayer before moving on to the next grave. Our first stop would be the grave of Johnny Miklo, Steve and Betty’s first son, who died when he was only five years old in 1946. Next we would look for the grave of Peter Miklo, Steve’s younger brother.  No one could seem to remember where it was so we would spend several minutes searching for it.  Finally we would visit Steve Miklo, Sr., and Emera’s grave.  Next to that was the grave of Anna Spal, Steve Sr’s, sister, who had also come over from Dravhovce, but lived in Wisconsin.  Years later we added the grave of Ed Jondle, Betty’s father, who died in 1973. I stopped going on these annual visits when I was about 16.

We never visited the other Jondle graves located in Graceland Cemetery in Elkhorn Township south of Fort Dodge.  Albert and Mary Jondle, who immigrated to Johnson County, Iowa from Southern Bohemia in 1869 and then later moved to Webster County, are buried there.  Albert (his Czech name was Vojtech) was born in 1824 and died in 1899.  Mary was born in 1836 and died in 1915.  Several of Albert and Mary’s children are buried there, including their son Michael (1868 to 1957) and his wife Christina (1873 to 1963).  Michael and Christina’s sons William and Henry are buried near their parents. Their daughter Julia Hefley is not buried in Graceland, nor is their oldest son Edward.  We visited his grave in Corpus Christi Cemetery.

Why was Edward buried in Corpus Christi rather than in Graceland Cemetery with his parents and brothers?  It may have simply been for convenience sake.  Ed’s widow, Helen, and his son Charlie, were living in Fort Dodge so it would have made sense for him to be buried there.  But there may have been deeper reasons.  We know that Ed and Helen had had a falling out with Michael when they had to move off his farm along Highway 169 when Michael had sold or lost it.

Pam (Jondle) Warner, a cousin from the Jondle side of the family wrote, “…there is a story my Grandpa Bill would tell about his dad Mike being upset with one of his boys for not doing his own farm work and that he blew up and said he was a "dead horse," and that was that and he was out of the family.  I don't know which brother it was, though.  I do remember that when something was no good they would call it a "dead horse."

Was Ed the son Michael was referring to as a “dead horse”?  If anyone knows the details about Ed Jondle’s burial plot please let us know.

UPDATE:  Pam Warner, whose grandfather was Ed's brother Bill, wrote, "Ed was not getting his field work done and Grandpa Mike found out that his (Ed's) brothers were covering for him and going over and doing it.  He got very upset and told my Grandpa Bill he was not to be doing Ed's work for him anymore. So that is why he got called a "dead horse."

Pam also wrote that, "Julia went to live with a son in Minnesota and passed up there - so is not in the family plot."

Here is a photo of the many Jondle monuments in Graceland Cemetery. 

Here is a photo of Albert and Mary Jondle's monument in Graceland Cemetery, Elkhorn Township.  The cemetery is located about a 1/4 mile east of County Road P151 and about a mile north of where the Bohemian Hall was located before it burned in August 2012. The cemetery is only about a mile northwest of the original Jondle farm where Albert and Mary settled when they came to Webster County. Albert and Mary are the source of all Jondles -  the Jondle name was created from the Czech name Čondl when they came to America in 1869.

Here is a photo of Michael and Christina's monument in Graceland Cemetery. See the posts on May 15 and May 23 for more about them.