Grass Where Their Names Should Be: Searching for the Graveyards of Relatives and Finding Missing Headstones
- Julie Tonseth
- Aug 19
- 2 min read
Updated: Aug 20
What started as a hobby in genealogy turned into an obsession—and eventually part of my work. I have tried to visit as many gravestones of my ancestors as I could. It started in 2014 with the trip to Trondheim, Norway where we saw the graves of my 2nd great-grandparents, Ole Christian Strøm Tønseth and his wife, Amalie Marie Rohde. They were buried in the same grave with their daughter Ragnfrid Stokke and her husband at Tilfredshet Kapell.
Each trip has been meaningful in different ways—from Norway, where I traced my roots back across the Atlantic, to Kentucky, where family connections seemed to spread across the whole town. My 3rd great-grandparents, Mary Goodan and James Clarke who lived in Morehead, Kentucky along with a lot of family members are buried there with so many others! Visiting that little town made me realize that I was probably related to half of the community there.. because "cousins."
Why am I bringing this up now? Is this part of an intervention therapy? Hello, my name is Julie and I am addicted to visiting dead relatives all over the world. Nope, it is because I decided that I am going to visit my paternal grandmother's family in Wichita, KS and started to do research in preparation. Here is where I got annoyed, my 2nd great-grandparents, John Philip Offenstein and his wife, Katherine "Katie" Kaltenborne/Kollenborn/Kilburne are buried in Maple Grove Cemetery in Wichita, Kansas. This is a huge cemetery, one of the biggest in Kansas and I was surprised (and grateful) to find detailed memorials for them on Find a Grave, complete with exact burial locations because it saves me a lot of time.
Two things stood out though:
1 - They are not buried together, or even near each other
2 - They don't have a grave marker
Their memorials are just a picture of grass, see below:
This likely means money was tight at the time, and their children couldn’t afford a marker. (I know their son, my great-grandpa, was not going to be able to do this.)
I called the cemetery to inquire about getting them a headstone and it seems like this wouldn't be a big deal, just money and time to figure out what to put on the marker. Katie had about 15 name combinations since immigrating from Germany, so that makes it tricky for me to decide what to post on her stone.And since they are not buried together, I will need to get 2 stones, instead of one that has both of their names on it, which means more cost. For any of the Offenstein family members out there that would like to contribute to this, please email me at julie@asfaund.com.
Gravestones aren’t just stone—they’re stories carved in place. I hope to give John Philip and Katie a marker worthy of their lives and place for future generations to go and pay their respects. Stay tuned for updates on this project.
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