Location: West Point, Payne County, Oklahoma, USA. (Glencoe, OK)
A few days ago, I went in search of local cemeteries. I’ve wanted to familiarize with cemeteries in the area for a while. I started by looking up the location of a couple of the closest, and started with Eberle Cemetery. Eberle Cemetery is a small family plot down the street from where I currently live. The address is technically in West Point, Oklahoma, which is functionally part of Glencoe. I had never been that far east, so I had no idea what to expect. I drove down VFW Road until I felt like I should be in the right area, but I didn’t see any entrance or signs of former entrance in the area. I pulled up the cemetery on findagrave.com and read in the description of one of the graves that the place I was looking for was in the trees, surrounded by a wrought iron fence. I had exited the car, determining I was in the right place, and started walking down the street while looking up the embankment for signs of the fence. I finally located the cemetery, trees and grass grown up along the street side making it almost disappear into the landscape. A barbed wire fence runs along the front, blocking it off from public access. I could have gotten better information if I had gone onto the land on which the cemetery sits, and that land is well-maintained and clear enough. I will return to get better photos and information.
The cemetery is home to eight known graves, and that sounds right given the size. Only a single headstone still exists within the fence, but since I did not got beyond the barbed wire fence I was unable to see which one it was. I did not see any other headstone, but according to information gathered by others on findagrave.com, those headstones are now lying outside of the cemetery in the nearby trees. That has been true since at least 2012, and nobody indicated what might have happened there. The ground that goes up to the cemetery has started to give at the very edge of the plot, and I worry that within a few years the whole thing will become structurally unsound. I don’t know what could be done to address the issue; some sort of retaining wall probably. These memorials are abandoned to such an extent that I doubt very much that there is anyone left to care what happens to the whole cemetery.
The cemetery has no known relationship with any of my families. I did decide to do a little research into those in the cemetery to confirm this, and to get a better sense of the people buried there.
The namesake of the cemetery are mother and daughter. Etta Marie Eberle was the first burial in 1895. The last known is Eliza Flowers on 24 Februrary 1900. A couple of the burials have unknown dates, but are all likely from the same period of time. One has a birthdate of 1901, but the burial date is unknown.
- Linnie L Eberle (1868-1897), wife of Alfred Eberle (who is a distant cousin). The couple married ABT 1885 in Missouri. They had four children: Dovey (b.1887 in MO), George Augusta (1890-1956), Etta Marie (1891-1895), & Charles Lewis (1894-1981). Alfred’s father died of “Epileptic Fit” while serving for the Confederacy in the Civil War, and the family lived in Benton County, Missouri for several years. They moved back to Critenden County, Kentucky shortly before his mother’s death in 1871. While I have no information on Linnie’s family, those are some possible places to look for more details. I was unable to locate Linnie’s maiden name.
- Etta Marie Eberle (1891-1895), four year old child of Linnie & Alfred.
- Esta Vansickle (1880-1896), fifteen year old daughter of Eliza Warner & George Washington Vansickle (1834-1886).
- Eliza Warner Vansickle (1840-1900), born in Flat Rock, Indiana, Eliza moved with her children to Oklahoma after her husband’s death. She and her daughter share a headstone. After her death, it appears that the family moved together to Caldwell County, Missouri, where there are still descendants of the couple. (featured photo is of Eliza & George Vansickle)
- Eliza Flowers (1899-1900), no information found. Flowers is a fairly common name in Payne County, so I assume she was a child belonging to a member of the local family.
- Tomey Flowers (1901-?), no information found. I assume the same about him as Eliza.
- Clyde Hinkle Malernee (1896-1897), infant son of Davi Bean Malernee & Ethel Hinkle. The couple married in Payne County, and it appears they lived a while in Ripley before ending up in the Oklahoma City area.
- infant son Mays, son of Isaac Dickerson “Dick” Mays (1869-1959) & Pleasant Delle “Plezzie” Ellis (1875-1957). Dick’s family was from Morris, Kansas. Plezzie was born in Iowa; her family was from Kentucky & Indiana. Both are buried in Bristow, Oklahoma.
