Even though I was born and spent a lot of time in California, I can’t deny that Ohio is the very firm foundation of my roots. I had never realized quite how deeply those roots went until I started doing genealogy and getting interested in cemeteries. Thus, this post was born — a combination of a cemetery addiction and my love of uncovering my past.

The Sophas--my maternal great-grandparents

For as long as I can remember, I only knew where two family members were buried. Okay, I take that back, it’s three–the Sophas. Arthur, Julia, and Robert Sopha, my grandparents and great-uncle, respectively. At least a couple times a year my maternal grandmother would go visit her parents to clean up their graves and at least once we happened to be back in Ohio visiting ,so I got to go. I didn’t really know who they were, but it was something cool we got to do. They’re buried in section 96 of Green Lawn in Columbus. She was a housewife who died in 1968; her husband followed in 1976. Obviously given that I was born in 1985, you can figure out whether I ever met them. They were Germans, with Arthur immigrating in the early 1920s with his parents. I haven’t found out yet when she came over, but she did sometime before 1925 considering that’s when they married. Their headstones are actually under that bush in the picture… I guess my grandmother doesn’t get out there as much anymore.

The open space where Robert is buried

Now that I’ve rambled about them for a while, I’ll move on to other people also in Green Lawn that I much more recently learned about. I swear this eventually moves away from there. While we’re discussing Sophas, I suppose I’ll go to Otto and Elsa–Arthur’s parents. They are buried not too far from their son and daughter-in-law and even closer to Robert. They were also really from Germany and came over with Arthur in the 1920s. He was also here earlier, but I don’t know the story behind that. So yes, that is all the Sophas in Green Lawn Actually, I think there might be a brother in there, but I’m not sure.

Otto Sopha

Elsa Sopha

3rd great-grandmother

I also discovered that I have several relatives from my dad’s side of the family are buried in Green Lawn as well. They’re all from my father’s, father’s, mother’s side of the family. I don’t know as much about them, except that my 3rd great-grandmother died 59 years ago yesterday getting hit by a taxi, ironically a stone’s throw from Green Lawn. It was a really wintery January night and I believe she was walking home from a church activity. She’s buried next to her husband, Philip, who died in 1947 and has an identical headstone. She was from Ohio, but he immigrated from Germany in 1882. Who has a lot of German in her? Oh yeah. This is also the cool/weird marriage in the family where her maiden name and her married name were the same.

Martha Magdaline Leiendecker

Their daughter is buried on the other side of Green Lawn, the mother of my still-living great-grandmother. Martha actually died in childbirth, I believe of her ninth child. I obviously never knew her, but imagine she was kind of strict from the general impression I’ve gotten of my great-grandmother’s life growing up. Also buried here with her is her son, Edward Richard Hauck, who died at the age of 10. I was going to say I didn’t know what of, but it was trench mouth. Genealogy makes you realize how young so many people died years ago, but that is an aside.

Near to the Haucks are my Wetzel relatives, who are my great-grandmother’s father’s side.

Albert Hauck, 2nd great-grandfather

Amelia Wetzel Hauck (remarried and became Yeager), 3rd great-grandmother

Frederick and Margaretha Iftner Wetzel, 4th great-grandparents from Germany