SAAR Cemetery Album

SAAR Cemetery Album - 16

Living History Performance • July 17 & 18, 2010

Saar Cemetery Living History Performance

This performance told the living history of six characters whose stories are taken from those buried in the Saar Pioneer Cemetery. Each character told their personal tale of life in Kent, from Margaret Saar to Civil War Veteran, Elias Clark.

A collaboration between The Saar Cemetery Living History Committee, Book-It Theatre, and Living Voices

WITH THE HELP OF THESE SPONSORS:

South King County Genealogical Society
Greater Kent Historical Society
Saar Pioneer Cemetery Project Committee
Goodwill Industries
and Hilda Meryhew

Made possible with support from 4Culture Heritage and Arts Site Specific Program.

download color flyer (adobe.pdf)

The Living History Program was also performed at the Kent Historical Museum on July 15^th as one of the museum's monthly dinner speaker series.

Click Images to enlarge.

Mary Almira (Shickler) Anderson • 14 December 1825 - 23 August 1905 Born Mary Almira Shickler, in Pennsylvania, she married James D. Anderson in Iowa. James and Mary had ten children, and the family moved to Versalilles, Missouri, after the Civil War, where James died in 1871. Mary and several of her grown children came to the Seattle area in 1888; homesteaded in Clallum County on the Forks Prairie, before moving to the Kent area about 1900. She lived near her daughters Cora and Amanda in the Suise Creek area, east of Kent, up until her death.


Elias Clark • 9 October 1831 - 18 August 1916 Born in Chenango County, New York, Elias Clark moved to Illinois, where he met and married Adaliza T. Hudson in 1854. Clark worked as a sewing machine sales agent, a teacher, and finally as a doctor. He enlisted in the Union Army in September 1862, serving in the 74th Illinois Infantry. Due to poor health he was discharged in December of the same year, but in September of 1864, he reenlisted, this time in the 20th Regiment of Michigan Infantry. He was mustered out in May 1865 in Washington D. C. Elias and Adaliza had six children. They moved to Iowa after the Civil War, briefly to Wisconsin, then to Oklahoma, before arriving in the Kent area about 1908. Elias Clark died at the Veteran's Home at Retsil, near Port Orchard in Kitsap County.


Stephen Park Willis • 3 September 1831 - 12 September 1906 Born in Putnam County, Illinois, S. P. Willis married Caroline White in Linn County, Iowa in 1855. In 1857, they traveled through the Panama Canal, stopping briefly in San Francisco, before moving to the Willamette Valley, Oregon. Two years later they bought a farm near Roseburg, and farmed in the Umpqua Valley until 1865 when he moved his family to the White River Valley of Washington Territory. He and Caroline had three children.

SHINN family connections include sisters Martha Rose and Lucy Caroline Vaughn Shinn, who were great-nieces of Stephen Willis. The William Shinn family and the William Mylorie family were important pioneers in the White River Valley, and contributed to the community and social life in early Kent.


James D. Iddings • 10 May 1842 - 9 April 1903 Born in Floyd County, Virginia, James Iddings joined the 54th Regiment of Virginia Infantry, CSA early in the Civil War. Taken captive at Dallas, Georgia, he was sent north to Rock Island, Illinois, where he was imprisoned for three months. He was released from prison and enlisted in the 3rd Infantry Regiment, Regular U. S. Federal Army in October 1864 and was discharged from that unit fall of 1865 at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. He then served in Co. B of the 6th West Virginia Infantry. In 1866 he married Rebecca Summer and they had ten children, only six of whom survived. The family came to Washington in 1890.


Mighill B. Maddocks • 1 January 1834 - 1 August 1904 Born in Bucksport, Hancock County, Maine, Mighill Maddocks, arrived on the west coast in 1859, landing first at San Francisco on a steamer that made the trip around Cape Horn. He reached Seattle in 1861 and made a canoe trip up the Duwamish and White rivers seeking a place to make his home. He took up a claim near what would become known as O'Brien, where he built his success. Mighill married Carrie Amanda Briggs, a native of New Brunswick, Canada, in 1879. The couple had no children.


Margaret Eunice (Olmstead) Saar • 31 January 1842 - 1 October 1873 Margaret Eunice Olmstead, the daughter of John Olmstead and Elizabeth Jane Gurnsey was born in Quincy, Illinois and died in Kent, Washington, at the age of 31. Margaret married Johann Peter Saar, son of John Martin Saar (1796-1863) and Anna Margareta Weilbrenner on 12 September 1858 in Roseburg, Oregon. Margaret and Peter Saar had eight children born between 1859 and 1873. The Saar Pioneer Cemetery is so named when Peter buried his wife on the family farm. Through the years other valley families buried their loved ones in the same area, and the cemetery grew to contain nearly 200 graves. Margaret's headstone has disappeared.



Book-it Theatre We are grateful to Rachel Atkins who wrote the script for A Living History Performance. A special thanks to Annie Lareau who arranged for the actors for A Living History Performance. Actors portraying the pioneers who are buried the Saar Pioneer Cemetery are: Andrew Litzky Llysa Holland Sylvie Davidson Alyson Branner James Weidman Matthew Shimkus Text by Sylva Coppock

Page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25