Old Lorimier Cemetery Archives

March 27, 2016

Crosses I Remember

Easter Sunday is a good day to look back at some of the crosses I’ve photographed over the years. We’ll start off with an aerial photo of Bald Knob Cross in Illinois at Alto Pass. Here’s how the photo was taken (and saved in the darkroom).

Bald Knob Cross from the ground

Here’s the cross from the ground.

Ft. Jefferson Cross at the Confluence

The Ft. Jefferson Cross at the Confluence in Wickliffe is pretty at night. By the way you CAN make the images larger by clicking on them.

Cape LaCroix Creek marker

The Cape LaCroix Creek marker has been a rolling stone looking for a home.

Old Lorimier Cemetery grave marker

When I took this photograph in the mid-1960s, the angel in the picture had wings and arms. She was vandalized twenty years later.

Elder B.A. Armour in 2013

Elder B.A. Armour’s faith is as important to him today as it was when I photographed him baptizing people in the Mississippi River off New Madrid in 1967.

New Madrid baptism

Elder Armour is on the left, and J.C. Pullen is on the right. The congregants marched from the Church of God in Christ church, through downtown New Madrid, and down to the river.

St. Mary’s Cemetery

I photographed this cross at St. Mary’s Cemetery twice – almost exactly 48 years apart.

Judas got a raw deal

Ken Saunders, a British citizen, walked across the country trying to convince people that Judas really wasn’t a bad guy. He liked what he saw of Missouri.

Dutchtown Cemetery

This old wooden cross is in the Dutchtown Cemetery on a ridge overlooking the slowly diminishing community below it. The dead outnumber the living.

St. Vincent’s Church at sunset

I was really planning to shoot Fourth of July fireworks, but St. Vincent’s Church at sunset caught my eye.

Crucifix came over with the Saxons

This Crucifix in Altenburg’s Trinity Lutheran Church, was made in Oberammergau, Germany, and came over with the Saxons in 1839. The Last Supper was installed in the altar in 1938.

Guardian Angels Catholic Church

The Guardian Angel Catholic Church in Oran is one of the most ornate houses of worship in the area.

February 26, 2015March 6, 2021

Angel with a Broken Wing

I ran across this yellowing print from the Old Lorimier Cemetery that I must have taken around 1966. You can see the an angel with wings and an upraised arm to the left of the big tree. There’s a tall monument to the left of it that has a cross on its top. Both of those grave markers would be vandalized about twenty years later.

Click on the photos to make them larger.

Mamie Lee Lilly

Mamie Lee Lilly was an 11-year-old girl who died Dec. 30, 1893. The March 22, 1989, Missourian reported that Terrell Weaver, Old Lorimier Cemetery’s sexton helped to piece together the apparent solution to a cemetery crime. More than 50 tombstones were vandalized the previous August. Police who served a search warrant at 129 South Lorimier recovered a damaged angel, a tombstone and a stone cross, which Weaver helped trace back to Old Lorimier.

Two men and a woman were suspects in the vandalism, but no charges had been filed when the story was written.

Made of hand-sculpted Italian marble

The angel, Weaver said, is made of hand-sculpted Italian marble. He thought the 100-pound cross belonged on top of the 10-foot-tall monument for the Albert family to the left of Mamie Lee. “I climbed up there yesterday and tried to feel the top,” he said, but the only way to be sure would be to fit the cross to the monument.

Old Lorimier Cemetery has about 2,000 tombstones. “Over the years, probably 90 percent have been vandalized,” Weaver was quoted.

December 3, 2013

Last Gasp of Fall Color

This fall wasn’t as colorful as last year. In fact, it felt like it came and went in about two days. Here’s a small collection of photos I did manage to grab. Most will have just an overline telling you approximately where the picture was taken.

The first shot was taken off the new Warren Avenue extension over Ramsey creek in Scott City. (Click on the photos to make them larger.)

Old Lorimier Cemetery

Gordonville cornfield

Old McKendree Chapel

A lot of the big old trees on the Old McKendree Chapel grounds have fallen victim to old age and storms, but it’s still a beautiful and peaceful place.

Leaves on Apple Creek

The last time I was looking over the old Old Appleton bridge, a gaggle of teenyboppers were jumping off it.

Trail of Tears Marina

OK, I cheated. I ran this before, but I like it well enough to show it again.

Illinois pumpkins

Looks like not all the pumpkins sold out for Halloween.

Old Lorimier Cemetery

December 14, 2012

Graveyards Are for Old People

Graveyards should be reserved for old people. We shouldn’t be burying grade school kids. I don’t feel like writing anything tonight. And, please, spare me your political rants.

This was taken in Old Lorimier Cemetery in the spring of 2011. You can click on it to make it larger.