One could consider themselves fortunate if they are not familiar with what it means to visit Baby Land. But for one family it was the closure needed for a sad family mystery half a century old. 

In 2010 a friend asked me to speak with one of his acquaintances, hoping that I could use my special skills to solve the mystery haunting their family for over 50 years. It seems that back in the mid 1960’s there was a birth and immediate death of a baby sister. All that was left now was a photo of two flower arrangements set on the ground with a faint image of a gravestone far off in the background bearing the name Brown. Additionally, there were the two floral cards that were placed on those flowers. The faint memories of the elderly family member only remembered that he might have been able to see the cemetery from the VA. The town he lived in at the time was in a part of the state I was not familiar with. Although the baby was born in a hospital, he could not remember which one and believed the baby was stillborn which may not have created a birth or death certificate.

This was a different kind of search for me back in 2010, but I did have some ideas on where to start my search. Little did I know the wonderful people I would meet along the way. My first call to the locals was Jean at City Hall. Jean could find no record of a baby with a matching last name in the 1960’s. She shared that there are 71 cemeteries in their small town. Some larger, but many attached to area churches. The first cemetery of interest was located close to a National Guard Armory and American Legion Hall. This seemed promising. I reached out to the original owners daughter-in-law. They had sold the funeral home but still owned the cemetery. She verified you could see the VFW from the property. I sent out the old photo hoping that it would spark a memory of where the baby might be. I was heart broken but not discouraged when she called to tell me that the pictured Brown gravestone was not in their large cemetery.

At this point I decided to take a detour and tried to track down one of the flower donors, a local Baptist church. The Pastor was so kind. He said he would ask around in church on Sunday to see if the family was known to any of the members. He cautioned me that the church could even have sent the flowers if the family had been local at the time. The address of the floral shop brought me information of another business entirely. In placing this call I met the next kind person of my journey. Sally shared that the owner of the floral shop died years ago but also shared she is actually a long time resident. When I told her my challenge she noted another cemetery that may fit the physical description of view that the father mentioned. But she was quick to warn that she has visited that cemetery and not to go without a can of ant spray as it had not been maintained for decades and was quite overgrown. I was not going to give up this easily.

So how many people with the name Brown do you think are in this small town? Yes, too many. So on to the next kind couple I met on this search. One of things I noticed as I searched for graves on findagrave.com, (yes that’s actually a thing) is that there was a couple by the name of Alton and Loudonia whose name kept popping up. If you think my hobby is odd this couple spends thousands of hours photographing and documenting graves. As my luck would have it they have visited this city and took some pictures. I quickly sent the photo of the Brown gravestone asking if they had any thoughts. I was shocked at the quick response. Alton actually had memories of the Brown gravestone. They traveled back to the cemetery and took a picture that aligned perfectly with the picture I had. The tree was now much bigger and shaded the area called Babyland. Of all the babies whose names were etched on stones in the photos that Alton sent me, the little one we were looking for was not among them. But I still felt in my heart and soul we were getting close to an answer for this family. On to the final earth angel that would make this all come together.

I was more than willing to make the 6 hour journey with ant spray in hand to find this grave but decided to first place another call to get more information on my destination. Remember my first call to Jean at city hall? I decided to call back to find out if she knew who managed the cemetery. In steps City Manager Gene. After hearing the story he climbed in his truck and headed to Babyland. As we spoke on the phone he got down on his hands and knees clearing the years of dirt and debris. Although there was no stone with a baby name, there was that empty space between two other babies that once held the flowers in the 50 year old picture.

Although we already knew there would not be a joyous ending to this search, we knew it would be a chance for a family of siblings to place a stone and say a final goodbye to the baby sister they never knew. Rest well little one….