November 1, 2020 marks the 102-year anniversary of the deaths of William & Irma Weider of Mount Vernon, Ohio.
They were buried the following week in a single plot at Mound View Cemetery. The graves of both were unmarked for a full century, until 2018, when their great, great grandson had placed markers for both.
That great, great grandson was me!
Why did I do it? The event was seemingly forgotten in Mount Vernon as soon as it happened.
And the event is not remembered by William’s or Irma’s descendants. If it was ever known, if it was ever talked about, it was forgotten since.
No, all of the actions I have taken, I took for my own great grandmother, Juanita Weider Bumpus, the daughter of William & Irma. Juanita was 17 the day her parents died.
And while Juanita has been gone for 40 years, I thought this a story deserved of being remembered, deserved of being told.
Told not to focus on the tragedy of this event, but a story needing to be told to celebrate the strength, resilience and courage of their daughter, my great grandmother.
Because I loved my great grandmother very much!
These events could have destroyed her, they did her brother, but she managed to place these events behind her. She outlasted this tragedy by over sixty years, during that time, she raised four children, each accomplished in their own ways.
One of those children was Marjorie, my grandmother.
And I hope somewhere, Juanita knows what I am doing and approves!
When I had finished A Life Well Lived, I asked my daughter, age 25, to take a look. She gladly did, coming back to me the next day, “She sounds like an amazing woman!”
Yes, she was!
And I hope all of you will take a look!!
Order “Juanita Bumpus: A Life Well Lived and a Story Not Known” on Amazon.
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