Friday, January 12, 2007

Not all roads lead to full brick walls

The continuation of the research story, as it unfolds. After contacting Crestview Memorial, I waited for a couple of days to see if they would indeed get back with me - but to no avail. Thus, I called them up to see if any progress had been able to be made. That is when I was informed that I should contact a certain local attorney and they gave me her phone number.
This happened fairly early in the morning, before I headed to work - so I hopped in my car and made the call on my cel phone. After a few minute on the phone with this wonderful lady, who turned out to be a CPA, she took down Jacob and Minnie's names and told me that she'd call back in a little while. It was delightful however that because of my long drive to work, on account of the nice snow storm that hit this lovely Beehive state, she was able to call me back before I reached work.
She informed me that she was not aware of any Sommerfelt's that had been buried out at Bowman cemetery, but that there was a plot of eight grave sites that had never been used - that were registered as being owned by a Sommerfield family. Though the evidence is not rock hard, I believe that these plots actually belong to the Sommerfelt's and that notwithstanding the fact that there are no burials that are recorded there - that this is the final resting place of Minnie Sommerfelt. She and I continued to talk and I gave her more finite dates - so that she could research it on her end. Meanwhile, I am doing everything I can on mine.
This mystery continued to plague my mind until I finally decided to call the Wichita Falls County Clerk again, to see if there was any additional information that I had missed from the first call. Come to find out, there was at least one item that I had not thought to ask before - which was if there was a funeral home listed as taking care of the proceedings. In fact, there was and it was listed as Owens & Brumley - so I found their phone number and gave them a ring.
What I found out from Owens & Brumley was further confirmation of Minnie's death date and the funeral home confirmed that they did indeed bury her at Bowman cemetery. I did ask to see if they could tell me where her grave was and unfortunately they couldn't because they didn't keep those kinds of records back in 1947. So, I remain in the situation that I was in before - I am sure that at least Minnie is buried in the Bowman Cemetery - though I am still not sure about Jacob.
The one really good piece of news that came out of my call to the funeral home, besides this confirmation, was the fact that there was an obituary printed in the newspaper for Minnie and they are supposed to be sending me a copy via email. I'm sure that I'll need to follow up on that. Likewise, I'm sure that I will need to give this wonderful CPA lady a call as well.
Well, looks like I am going to call it a day - so that I can get hot on the trail again tomorrow.

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