Many of you have read this article before, both for those who haven't, I want to post it again. I believe this article was researched by John Butler. I wonder if UPS and FedEx have problems like this? / Ron
December 31, 1906
The Lake County Times
Joseph Aber Finds Rest at Last
Considerable excitement prevailed this morning when it became
known that the remains of Joseph Aber of Kansas City, which had been
shipped from Hammond via the Monon railroad and left at the Monon
depot over night, had been returned to Chicago for want of a claimant.
The most excited person connected with the mix-up was Charles
H. Stewart, the undertaker who had been engaged to take charge of the
body and arrange for its burial. It was through his delinquency that the
error was made, and as mistakes are totally unlooked for in an
undertaker, above all others, he was raising heaven and earth in an effort
to recover the wandering casket and its contents, and incidentally to
conceal the fact of his responsibility from the press and the public.
Mr. Stewart had been expected to meet the remains at a certain
hour this morning and as the box containing the latter was marked for
delivery at Englewood, and no one claimed it, Captain Downing of the
Monon, believing that an error had been made, returned it on the first
train. It was consigned to the charge of John Avery, but Avery was not on
hand either and thus began the pitiful post mortem wanderings of all that
was mortal of the late Joseph Aber.
The latter was a brother of Mrs. Whitney, who formerly lived in
Hammond on Plummer avenue. Mrs. Whitney owns a lot in one of the
cemeteries in this vicinity and for this reason desired to bury her brother in
Hammond. The Kansas City undertaker who prepared the body for burial
had been notified to ship the remains to Englewood which is now the
home of Mrs. Whitney, but later the order was changed, and Hammond
was named as the destination and the express company notified to this
effect.
The address being named as Englewood, together with the
absence of a claimant, caused the agent at the Monon to believe that a
mistake had been made so he sent the box back to Chicago on an early
Monon train, against the judgment, however, of the conductor of the train,
who finally consented to take the box aboard.
When Mrs. Whitney arrived and learned that an error had been
made she was very much excited and it was only by a great effort of will
power that she restrained herself from becoming hysterical. Someone
upon whom she had depended to notify others interested of the arrival of
the remains when they finally did reach their destination after being
bandied about from Dan to Bersheba, had failed her as the undertaker
had, and she wrung her hands and seemed in the greatest distress.
The arrival finally of two men, apparently farmers, had the effect of
calming her when she was wrought up again by the actions of the
undertaker’s female assistant, who insisted upon her leaving the shop and
going to the rooms above, because of the arrival of a Chicago newspaper
representative, who wished to know the facts.
Mrs. Whitney, who is very much of a lady, wished to treat the
newcomer with courtesy, but the female assistant, inquiring “what all the
stink†as she expressed it, was about, hustled the mourning woman from
the room and proceeded to give a piece of her mind to the reporter. In
this she was assisted by Stewart, who had great difficulty in expressing
himself, and was pale with rage.
An effort was made to secure the services of Rev. Shirey, but
failing in this, as the divine was away from home, another minister was
finally secured and the much traveled remains were laid to rest.
It is probable the expense of the extra travelling will have to be
footed by the undertaker, who, as near as can be gathered, was
responsible for the mistake, by failing to be on hand to take charge of the
remains when he should have been, but instead left them in the depot
over night.
