Traveling Through Time With the Shelby County Historical Society
Feature on Jennie Pearl Bretches. Topic: PEOPLE
Written by Jim Sayre in December, 1996

LAND DEVELOPMENT ONCE SCENE OF FRANKLIN TOWNSHIP TRAGEDY...Pg 2

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Kelsey was listed with almost $4,000, compared with Sidney businessman I. H. Thedieck ($10,500), Buckeye Churn Co. ($7,120), Wagner Manufacturing Co. ($4,100), Sidney Printing Co. ($3,500), and manufacturer Philip Smith ($2,970). In another interesting juxtaposition of historical fact, the same Journal issue reported a transfer of title creating the new Franklin Township cemetery. "The Trustees of the Reformed congregation at Swanders have filed a petition to authorize them to sell one-quarter of an acre of the church property, to reinvest the money in adjoining land, and finally to make over the whole property to the Trustees of Franklin township for graveyard purposes--all in accordance with a resolution passed by the congregation May 14, 1893." Over a hundred years later, Pearl Cemetery is once again undergoing major changes, with the addition of an 11-acre plot of land which will include more burial sites plus the new Franklin Township house now under construction.

"The first authentic burial after the cemetery was platted in 1893 was that of Jennie P. (Pearl) Bretches who died June 16th, 1893," according to the Adams-Mozley book, Memorial Records of Shelby County, Ohio, 1819-1975. "Others were buried earlier and ...transferred from the old St. Jacob Lutheran Cemetery one quarter mile north." "Pearl Cem. named for her..." according to the book Shelby Co. Newspaper Deaths, 1863-1899.

Two monuments guard Pearl’s resting place in the old northeast portion of the cemetery. A large obelisk displays her name and the dates of her birth and death. A much smaller stone about three feet east and alongside a graveled roadway has the name "Pearl" carved on top. On the stone’s face, this verse reminds us of the sadness felt by those 800 attending her funeral:

"A precious one from us has gone A voice we loved is stilled
A place is vacant in our home Which never can be filled.
God in his wisdom has recalled The boon his love had given
And though the body slumbers now The soul is safe in Heaven."

Pearl Cemetery is today a quiet, peaceful place along busy county road 25-A, not far from Interstate 75. It is beautifully cared for by Ed Counts, Jim "Monk" Meyers, and the Franklin Township trustees. Immediately adjacent to Pearl’s stone is a large monument to J.T. Kelsey who died in 1903 at 66 and his wife Jane Russell Kelsey who died in 1898, guarding her in death as he tried to do in life. While the farm fields of her childhood are being ripped by bulldozers to be developed into an urban-type development, Pearl and her cemetery will likely maintain a serene rest.

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