Osage Cemetery

Duane's take

The official marker for Osage Cemetery in Coryell County tells it like this, and I'll do my best to honor that telling. Now, when folks started putting down roots in the Osage community, they needed a place to lay their dead. That need came early.

About the mid-1870s, soon after settlement began, residents started using this ground as a burial place. And here's the thing that gives you pause: unmarked burials suggest somebody may have been using this spot even before that. The earth keeps its own records, and not all of them have names.

The first marked burial, the one we can point to and say with certainty, is that of R. P. Doherty, dating to 1874.

One name. One stone. And from there, a community's story started accumulating in the ground.

Now, you might assume a graveyard used by an entire community would belong to that community. You'd be wrong. In its early years, this cemetery was privately owned, held by real estate surveyor and investor Luther Kimbell and his sister Josephine Kimbell.

The whole community was burying its people in somebody else's land. That arrangement held until 1885. That year, Josephine Kimbell had the cemetery platted around the existing graves.

She made it official, gave it legal shape, and began commercial operation of the cemetery. It had taken more than a decade of burials for this ground to be legally designated a cemetery at all. Then, in 1892, Luther Kimbell assumed responsibility for the graveyard.

He operated it for the rest of his life. Brother and sister, passing stewardship back and forth across the years, while generation after generation of Osage families brought their people here. Since 1970, the Osage Cemetery Association has maintained the grounds, carrying that responsibility forward.

Today, this cemetery holds over eight hundred marked and unmarked graves. Among them rest Osage's earliest settlers, and veterans who served in the Civil War, World War I, World War II, and the Korean War. It is the only cemetery to have ever served this community.

One place, one piece of ground, holding all of it. Some cemeteries are monuments. This one is a mirror.

Every family that ever called Osage home has someone in that soil, and that, more than any stone or marker, is what pioneer heritage actually looks like.

What the marker says

Residents of the Osage community began using this site as a burial place about the mid-1870s, soon after area settlement began. Though the presence of unmarked burials indicates possible earlier usage, the first marked burial, that of R. P. Doherty, dates to 1874. Although used by the community, the graveyard was privately owned by real estate surveyor and investor Luther Kimbell and his sister Josephine Kimbell during its early years, and was not legally designated a cemetery until 1885. That year, Josephine Kimbell had a cemetery platted around the existing graves and began commercial operation of the cemetery. In 1892, Luther Kimbell assumed responsibility for the graveyard, which he operated for the rest of his life. The Osage Cemetery contains over 800 marked and unmarked graves, including those of Osage's earliest settlers and veterans of the Civil War, World War I, World War II,and th Koren War. It has been maintained by the Osage Cemetery Association since 1970. The only cemetery to have served this community, the historic burial ground is a tangible reminder of the area's pioneer heritage.