Who, what, where, when and how: a comprehensive archival investigation of the Milwaukee County Institution Grounds Cemeteries, 1882-1925

Summary

Since its discovery during the original 1990s excavations, the Register of Burials at the Milwaukee County Poor Farm Cemetery has been the foundation for most historical and archaeological research involving the Milwaukee County Poor Farm Cemetery. Until recently the register was considered a complete listing of most, if not all, burials on the Milwaukee County Grounds between 1882 and the final burial in 1974. However, new excavations during the summer of 2013 as well as comprehensive archival investigations of Milwaukee County death certificates and coroner’s inquests have shown that the burial activities on the county grounds were far more complex than the register suggests. This paper provides a summary of the archival findings including a detailed demographic profile of the burial population. A comparison of this data with that generated solely from the register will highlight the potential pitfalls of relying on a single documentary source. In addition, a brief discussion of how this comprehensive archival research will allow this author to identify individuals from this unmarked pauper’s cemetery will be provided.

SAA 2015 abstracts made available in tDAR courtesy of the Society for American Archaeology and Center for Digital Antiquity Collaborative Program to improve digital data in archaeology. If you are the author of this presentation you may upload your paper, poster, presentation, or associated data (up to 3 files/30MB) for free. Please visit http://www.tdar.org/SAA2015 for instructions and more information.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)   •
• People that no one had use for, had nothing to give to, no place to offer: The Milwaukee County Institution Grounds Poor Farm Cemetery

Keywords

Spatial Coverage