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Pioneer Memorial Gardens
Wheeler, Grant County, Washington
14403 Road 2 NE,
Wheeler WA 98837-9324
509-765-6500
Lat: 47° 06' 58"N, Lon: 119° 10' 46"W
T19N R28E Section 28
Submitted by Maggie Rail, © Oct 16, 2006, last edited Oct
11, 2012 [mrail@asisna.com].
Total records = 5,181.
From I-90 driving west as you are entering the Moses Lake area,
take the Wheeler turnoff, turning right onto Wheeler Rd NE and continue
to Wheeler. Turn right or south onto Road O for one mile, then turn
right or west onto Road 2NE. The cemetery is on the south side of
the road. Be sure to get permission at the office first before entering
the cemetery.
Pioneer Memorial Gardens was established in 1905, it was a one
acre City Cemetery, then it was deeded to the Oddfellows in the
1950s who expanded it to about 9 acres, and in 2001 it was purchased
by the Benson Family who are expanding it again. - Per Susan Benson
In the early days when this cemetery was established in Wheeler,
there was no Moses Lake town. It was called Neppel, Washington
back then. Many things changed before this cemetery was considered
to be the cemetery for Moses Lake area.
I tried to physically read this cemetery when I visited it
on Jul 17, 2005, and was told by Mr Benson to remove myself
from the property and was unable to gain permission from him
to return to the cemetery to read it myself. One must obtain
permission to enter this cemetery from the main office and I
was told I needed to have a family member buried there to visit
only their burial site.
In my frustration I did some research, trying to find at least
some of those buried here. My main source being the Grant County
Genealogy Society, who allowed me to re-publish records they
have in their library. These records included work done by Shane
Palmer to earn his Eagle Scout degree in 1990.
After transcribing from those I compared with other records,
such as Social Security records, obits and other public records.
Thus I did not copy totally from any one source, and all
are previously published records. I ask anyone who has the
name and dates of someone buried in this cemetery to please
consider sharing them with me, if they are not listed. If you
have a photo in digital format of the stone I would like to
see that also. Obituaries or other public records will be gladly
accepted.
Listings with an asterisk are those I do have a photo of the
stone. Some photos are not good, since the area I was in had
very poor stone care. Some stones were buried under grass, others
covered with lichen etc. They mow the lawn, but there is not
much care around some of the stones I saw.
I was warned of this when I was reading other Grant County
cemeteries, but I really did not believe it could be true, after
all the hundreds of cemeteries I have read. Later I find out
there have been demonstrations at this cemetery, carried out
by the neighboring townspeople, according to the local newspapers
and law enforcement office. Also it is said that some have removed
their loved ones from this cemetery to another cemetery, because
of the new business practices and no freedom to visit the burial
sites. It would be wonderful if the townfolks platted out land
and created a new cemetery that is open to all.
At that time the owners, the Benson Family, did not understand
that searching of names requires first knowing the name of the
person who is actually buried there, or having the name but
have no idea what cemetery they are buried in. Mrs Benson informed
me that she is there to help anyone if you give her the name
to look up. What she did not understand at that time was that
many do not have the needed information to ask her. This is
one reason why I do this hard work. I am not reimbursed in any
way for doing any of this transcribing.
New Chapter:
I the summer of 2010, Susan Benson provided me with a list
of all of the burials in this cemetery. I have spent many months
researching these names using the SS death index and the Washington
State Archives trying to acquire the birth and death dates for
each person. There are hundreds that I could not find this information
for, which are now only listed with the name, burial date and
location. I also compared this list with what I had, combining
when I could and I now have a much larger cemetery transcription
than I had at first.
This now includes the locations of each burial from the cemetery
sexton files. Some at first names I had listed a different location,
which I changed to be the same as the cemetery sexton has. If
anyone does know the birth and death dates (or death and age)
of any I do not have I would be very happy to add that information.
Visiting the cemetery is possibly different now, I suggest you
contact the cemetery to find out.
The record I first had was fairly complete up to the year 2000
with many errors. Additional names were added as I found them,
but not a complete listing after that date. Entries followed
by initials are names submitted to me to add to my listing from
others, which were not found in the sexton files. This is now
a complete listing of all names up to the Aug 01, 2010.
- Maggie Rail
Legend:
b. = born
c/o = child of
d. = died
d/o = dau of
FH = Funeral home
m. = married
s/by = stone by |
s/o = son of
s/w = stone with
w/o = wife of
* = have a photo
Gr = grave
[BL] = per Beth Lee
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Garden of Communion - GC
Garden of Deseret = GDes
Garden of Devotion = GDev
Garden of Holy Cross = GHC
Garden of Love = GL
Garden of Meditation = GMd
Garden of Memories = GM
Garden of Good Shepherd = GGS
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Pioneer Section = P
Garden of Serenity = GSer
Garden of Tranquility - GT
Garden of Peace = GP
E Columbarium = ECol
W Columbarium = WCol
Tranquility Columbarium = GT Col
Memories Columbarium = GMem Col
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