The Vertical Phonograph

While outside of the regular time frame for this blog, the information below might be of interest to some.

In the 1930s and early 1940s Jehovah’s witnesses were well known for taking portable phonographs on their house to house calls and playing recordings of J F Rutherford. A whole series of door step introductions were prepared, and longer recordings of convention talks were used for follow-up visits. These recordings were covered in an old article that was republished on this blog.

https://jeromehistory.blogspot.com/2019/01/the-watchtower-ibsa-recordings.html

To assist with “quick off the draw” doorstep presentations, a special phonograph was invented, which could be played closed and upright. Here are a couple of scans from the patent document. The original runs to six pages.

The inventor was John G Kurzen JUNIOR and the patent was filed in 1940, and the model was released at conventions in 1940.

The Kurzen family had a long history with the Watch Tower Society. John G Kurzen SENIOR was John Gottleib Kurzen (1868-1963). He and his wife Ida were full time volunteer workers for the Watch Tower Society for decades. When they died, within months of each other in 1963, their grave marker had both their names and the words JEHOVAH’S WITNESSES in large full capitals on it. It also contained an extract of Revelation 20 v.6, crediting the New World translation.

The grave marker can be viewed here:

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/84157906/john_gottleib_kurzen

The site also contains a very positive obituary for John and Ida as Pioneer ministers from a local newspaper.

John Senior and Ida had three children, a girl and two boys. The two boys, John G Junior (John Godfrey Kurzen) and Russell Kurzen both worked at the Society’s Brooklyn headquarters for decades.

When John G Jr. (the inventor of this special phonograph) died in 1980 he was buried at the Watchtower Farms Cemetery at Walkill.

Another chapter from a new book

This is the second and final extract to appear here from a recently published book called GRAVE MATTERS about the United Cemeteries in Ross Township, Pittsburgh. Details of the book are given in the previous two posts on this blog. Some readers, while not being interested in a book, may still be interested in the focus of this second sample chapter which can be viewed as a stand-alone subject.

5. MIRACLE WHEAT 

A somewhat bizarre part of the United Cemeteries story is Miracle Wheat which was actually grown on the property.

This was a type of wheat first promoted by a farmer named Kenton Ballard Stoner (1839-1924) in Virginia in 1904. He claimed he found a special strain of wheat growing in his garden. Allegedly it had an unusually high number of stalks producing fully matured wheat.

Stoner cared for it and two years later in 1906 it was dubbed “Miracle Wheat.” If the story in the Perry County Democrat for 31 August 1910 is to be believed, it was Stoner who named it as an answer to prayer.

Stoner’s tale was that after finding the wheat in his garden he nurtured it; it then produced a wonderful crop, which allowed him to make lots of money to look after his family. In the newspaper account, Stoner was backed up by a government report. We will come to that shortly. However, it should be noted that in examination and cross-examination in court in 1913, Stoner denied ever making it a matter of prayer. He also denied naming it “Miracle Wheat,” although he couldn’t remember who did.

Miracle Wheat received a considerable amount of publicity.

Even critics admitted it was a great producer, but questioned its capacity to make decent flour. Supporters countered with tales of blending the wheat to come up with – what we might call in modern parlance – the best thing since sliced bread.

A key selling point in most accounts was the government report that Stoner mentioned. It was made by one H. A. Miller. Some have questioned who he really was. What we can say is that Miller really did exist, he really was a government official and he really did visit the Stoner farm.

Miller was an Agricultural Economist. He had a particular interest in tales of high yielding crops, as shown in this Farmers’ Bulletin from February 1916.

His visit to the Stoner farm was widely reported. A typical example is from The Hutchinson News for 26 September 1908.

Numerous newspapers published these positive comments on the wheat, and continued to do so for the next eight years, up until 1915.

That cut-off date is significant, because in 1916 the U.S. Department of Agriculture finally published a 28-page report entitled Alaska and Stoner, or “Miracle” Wheats. This cast serious doubt on Miller’s report as presented. The publication dealt with claims made for two strains of wheat and devoted over half its length to the Miracle Wheat story thus far. What follows is taken from this official government publication.

One of the first things the paper established was that Kent Stoner was not quite just a folksy farmer who found a new strain of wheat. Stoner was a businessman who worked hard to market his wheat. In 1907 he made a deal with a company in Philadelphia to promote “Miracle Wheat.” The next year he also made a deal with a seed company in Indiana but this time called it “Marvelous Wheat.” It was also named “Eden” and “Forty-to-One.” The Department of Agriculture preferred to go back to basics and called it “Stoner Wheat.”

In fairness to all concerned, comparing varieties of wheat was not always an exact science. Depending on soil, climate, location, time of year and seeding techniques employed, the results could be variable. MY “miracle” could be YOUR “problem.” After extensive trials their considered judgment on page 27 was: “It is not as good as some and is somewhat better than others.”

However, under the subheading “Exploitation in Philadelphia” on page 17 the report had this to say:

“In the early spring of 1908 the promoter organized a company to exploit the wheat and a 20-page illustrated circular was issued. Plausible in most of its language, the circular contained several erroneous statements. For instance, it contained what was said to be the report of the Government agent who inspected the fields of Stoner (Miracle) wheat. The language was so changed, however, as to alter entirely the meaning of the report. The statement that in one field the Miracle wheat had yielded from 3 to 5 bushels more than other varieties on the same farm was made to read “two to three times the yield of other varieties.” In like manner, the figures for the average number of heads to each plant in the field and in the breeding nursery were greatly exaggerated.”

They did not go as far as accusing Stoner of dishonesty; for one thing, he was still very much around at the time. Nonetheless, somewhere along the line and quite early on, Miller’s words had been changed. It seems strange that no-one noticed before (including Miller) and the glowing testimonial was just accepted and repeated at face value from then on.

When the Watch Tower Society became involved, no-one could accuse them of dishonesty; they simply reprinted what everyone else had been saying for some time.

The wheat appears to have come to CTR’s attention in early 1908. The word “Miracle” probably caught someone’s eye. In line with hopes of restitution of mankind and the earth being transformed into a paradise he made a brief comment in The Watch Tower for 15 March 1908. In the opening “Views from the Watch Tower” section he commented on a current news item:

The short article had a few extracted newspaper comments, all positive, along with Miller’s report, which in the version then in circulation used such expressions as “its quality seems to be as good as, if not superior to, other varieties of winter wheat,” and “excellent results.”

Apart from the “earmarks of truth” comment in the opening paragraph (was that an unconscious pun?), the only other personal comment CTR made was in the final wrap-up.

That was it. Under normal circumstances, it would have been an end to the subject, a passing paragraph in a magazine article. Enter United Cemeteries and the Cemetery Superintendent, John Adam Bohnet.

The land the Cemetery Company owned totalled ninety acres and only about eighteen of them were ever used for the cemetery. This meant that there was a large swathe of adjoining farmland that could be used for other purposes. Bohnet had farming experience because he had worked on a farm until the age of twenty-four. According to Bohnet’s own account (which we will come to later) an agent for Kent Stoner called on CTR after hearing about The Watch Tower reference. It wasn’t Stoner himself; CTR and Stoner only met for the first time at a subsequent trial. The agent showed CTR a sample of the wheat in the hope that he might give it more publicity. At that time, CTR didn’t. When the agent shut the sample case, some chaff blew out and apparently two grains of wheat with it, which fell onto the carpet. CTR had no known farming experience, but he picked up the seeds and later, at Bohnet’s request, gave them to him. Bohnet then sought permission from Cemetery Manager, Walter Spill, which must just have been a formality, and attempted to grow it there. From his personal experience, as he saw it, the yield was exceptionally good. So he purchased more seed and donated some of the new crop to the Watch Tower Society.

This is where the problems arose. Three years after the initial reference, Bohnet suggested a fund-raising exercise. Many Watch Tower readers were small-scale farmers. They could buy the seed on the understanding that they were really making a donation to the Watch Tower fund. It seemed like a good idea at the time. Bohnet announced that he had bought more seed at one dollar twenty-five cents a pound, so he proposed offering it at one dollar a pound. Other Bible Student farmers including a Samuel J Fleming of Wabash, Indiana, joined him in this. It was claimed that the same wheat seed was then being sold by others at this figure or higher.

This announcement was made inside the front cover of the 1 June 1911, Watch Tower magazine.

There was another brief announcement about shipping inside the cover of the August 1 issue of the magazine, and that was it. There were no further references to it in any magazine throughout 1911. It was hardly a big campaign and a casual reader of the paper could easily have missed it.

Unfortunately, three months after the above announcement was made, the price dropped elsewhere. In September of that year Stoner and his business partners found they had a glut of seed, so drastically reduced the price to five dollars a bushel. (For wheat calculations, a bushel is sixty pounds). However, in a sense this was irrelevant; the original Watch Tower deal was simply adherents buying the seed but understanding that in so doing they were really making a donation to the cause. As The Watch Tower notice commented, Bohnet would give “the entire proceeds to our Society.”

Then the accusations started.

The basic charge was that CTR had claimed that a strain of wheat was miraculous, had marketed it at inflated prices to a credulous public, and then had personally pocketed the proceeds. This had to be fraud. It was hedged a little more subtly than that; the lawyers had gone over it first, but that was the general drift.

The Brooklyn Daily Eagle newspaper had a history of attacking CTR. They attacked the idea of United Cemeteries and suggested that respected Pittsburgh clergy were “conned” into supporting it. This has been dealt with in chapter one: these clergymen were never asked for money and frankly must have been rather obtuse if they didn’t notice who they had signed up with. But The Eagle’s agenda was quite plain.

The best policy might have been to ignore the newspaper. Yesterday’s news tends to be ephemeral by nature. People, then as now, read a newspaper that panders to their prejudices, and generally forget the details when the next issue appears. The problem with “Miracle Wheat” was that CTR and his associates didn’t ignore it. The story might have faded into obscurity had they done so.

The catalyst was a satirical cartoon in 1911. The Brooklyn Union Bank had recently gone bankrupt, and The Brooklyn Daily Eagle had conducted a campaign against it accusing the directors of fraud. They published a cartoon, satirising the Union Bank as the Onion Bank, and making a reference to Pastor Russell and the sale of “miracle wheat.”

Below is from The Brooklyn Daily Eagle newspaper for 23 September 1911. The image is taken from the Google books trial transcript exhibits of C T Russell vs. The Brooklyn Daily Eagle from January 1913.

 

CTR sued. The testimony is fascinating and we have the transcript of this trial to thank for much of the information covered in chapter one. But he lost the case.

 

As noted, the case came to court in January 1913. The trial soon got bogged down on testimony on how good the wheat was. It was a case of you call your experts and I’ll call mine. Dozens of satisfied farmers waxed lyrical about it, a government official was more neutral. The testimony veered off into other attacks on CTR. His estranged wife Maria came to Brooklyn and turned up in court, appearing for The Eagle. All she supplied was that CTR held the majority of voting shares in the Society, which was a matter of public record anyway.

On its own it was a non-event, but maybe it had a bearing on why CTR, who was present in court, did not give evidence personally. One can just picture him and Maria watching each other across the courtroom. As his counsel J F Rutherford would later note in his booklet A Great Battle in Ecclesiastical Heavens, it wasn’t CTR’s wheat. He had no first-hand information on it. He didn’t discover it, didn’t name it, and received no personal benefit from it. The Society received the donations, and CTR had a controlling interest in the Society, but these donations were for its religious work.

It was also argued by The Eagle’s lawyers that the Watch Tower Society’s reputation had not suffered by the newspaper’s attacks because its receipts, provided by W E Van Amburgh, had consistently risen over the previous three years. All in all, the argument that CTR had sustained loss as a result of a cartoon did not go well.

After the Canadian Ross libel trial, CTR commented in The Watch Tower for 1 October 1915: "We are not certain that we did the wisest and best thing – the thing most pleasing to the Lord in the matter mentioned." On reflection, CTR might have said much the same for the Miracle Wheat case.

The aftermath was that all who had bought wheat were advised they could have a full refund, and the total proceeds, about $1,800, were kept in a special account for that purpose. No-one charged CTR with fraud and no-one asked for their money back. They had been happy to donate in the same way that John Adam Bohnet had originally been happy to donate the seed.

A few years later, Bohnet wrote up his experiences in an article in The Golden Age magazine for 9 April 1924. Some of his article is a polemic against clergymen who had chosen to attack CTR, not on doctrine, but on a sideline like “Miracle Wheat.” However, by extracting the relevant paragraphs, this is how he told the story in his own words:

“Facts about Miracle Wheat

Much has been said and written about Miracle Wheat and its superiority over the more common strains of wheat; and people in general were thought to be quite well informed on the subject. And not only are they neglecting to preach the gospel, but they are engaged in evil speaking.

It seems, however, that some ministers are not informed and are given to misleading utterances to their congregations instead of adhering to the delivery of the gospel message.

Pastor Russell Had No Wheat

In the first place, Pastor Russell never sold a pound of Miracle Wheat, and never even had a pound of it to sell. Here are the exact facts:

Pastor Russell learned that a Mr. Stoner of Fincastle, Virginia, had some Miracle Wheat, that the original stool had 214 stalks, and that Mr. Stoner was raising this strain of wheat with a view to selling it for $1.00 per pound. Pastor Russell therefore made mention of it in his journal, The Watch Tower. When some time later the agent of Mr. Stoner out of courtesy for the Watch Tower article, called upon Pastor Russell and showed him a sample of the wheat, two grains of the wheat fell upon the carpet in Pastor Russell’s study. These grains were picked up by him and on request were handed to the writer.

I planted the two grains in my garden, and raised from them 1,312 grains of wheat. These I planted in turn, and raised five and one-third pounds. I in turn planted the same and raised eight and one-half bushels. Then I wrote to Pastor Russell, telling him that I wanted interested Watch Tower readers to have each pound of this wheat for their planting, and suggested that $1.00 per pound should be charged for it, and that every Watch Tower reader who had ground space would gladly pay this price to get a start. “For,” said I, “they will send in a dollar or more, anyhow, for the spread of the gospel; and thus the wheat will be broadcast fairly well; and whatever money may be received for these eight and one-half bushels of wheat I want placed in the general fund of the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society for the spread of the truth.”

To this Pastor Russell readily agreed, and placed in his journal a notice of Miracle Wheat securable at $1.00 per pound. The wheat was mine; I, J. A. Bohnet, set the price at $1.00 per pound; Pastor Russell had nothing to do neither with the price-making, nor with the sale of the wheat, except at my suggestion to make mention of it in his journal.

I then purchased a peck of this wheat myself and planted it for other sales which I made; and I paid $1.00 per pound. So I was not charging others any more than I myself was willing to pay.

The Yield from One Pound

The lowest yield from one pound sown that was reported to me was eighty pounds, and the highest reported was two hundred and twenty pounds from one pound sown. Therefore the wheat was miracle sure enough.

Wheat Testimony in Court

When nine of the thirty Miracle Wheat growers at the court trial had given testimony in favor of this wheat, the presiding judge stated in substance that the superiority of Miracle Wheat over all other strains of wheat had been so thoroughly demonstrated that any further testimony in favor of Miracle Wheat would be superfluous. The other twenty-one Miracle Wheat growers were therefore not called upon to give testimony.

People do not like the name "Miracle,” Therefore in various parts of the country this same wheat goes by the name of the man who introduced it there; as for instance, in Tennessee it is called ''Hobbs wheat"; in Maryland, "Weber wheat"; and in some places "Stoner wheat." Nobody has called it "Russell wheat" that I know of; nor has it been called ''Bohnet wheat." But the preachers delight in slapping at Pastor Russell about Miracle wheat, when in reality he had no connection whatever therewith.

Miracle Wheat of Superior Quality

Wherever Miracle Wheat has been shown in competition with other strains of wheat at the state and county fairs, it has always taken first prize and the sweepstake prize. The Webers of .Maryland hold the silver cup of three successive years of prize winnings with this wheat over all other wheats.

The chief difficulty with Miracle Wheat growing is that the farmer sows it too thick. In this case it will not stool. The wheat must be sown very sparsely. When rightly sown, it stools out wonderfully. I have frequently found thirty straws from one grain sown. I have found often fifty straws, all of good heading, from a single grain. I have seen as many as ninety stalks from one grain, and the same six feet tall.

Mr. McKnight, the wheat expert, who traversed every wheat district in Europe, testified under oath that in all his life he had never seen as many as four stalks from one sown grain of wheat, excepting Miracle Wheat. This testimony the writer personally heard in the court room.

Miracle Wheat is all that Pastor Russell proclaimed it to be. If anyone is at fault for charging $1.00 per pound for the Miracle Wheat, it is the writer. Those who paid a dollar for one pound never made a "kick"; they paid it gladly.”

Bohnet’s reference to the wheat being renamed by other growers ties in with a news item in The New Era Enterprise for October 19, 1920. Here the reference is to prize-winning “Weber Wheat” as grown by the H. Weber and Sons Company of Maryland. The company had been founded by Henry Weber, a former vice-president of the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society (although not the first vice-president as the article suggests). This Enterprise article was also written by John Adam Bohnet.

Looking back, CTR probably wished that Bohnet had kept his bright ideas to himself. It would have been better if Bohnet had just sold the wheat direct and then made his own personal donation to the Society and its work.

Chapter from a new book

A recently published book (September 2024) GRAVE MATTERS is a detailed examination of the United Cemeteries in Ross Township, Pittsburgh. It contains a preface, introduction, fifteen chapters and two appendices, with numerous photographs covering well over 100 years of history. Further details are in the post that follows this one. But here is a sample chapter – Chapter 8 – THE PYRAMID.

8. THE PYRAMID

The above photograph from the early 1920s shows CTR’s grave, and then a large pyramid monument further down the hill, which remained in place until 2021. The pyramid was in the center of a special area that still belongs to the Watch Tower Society. In the middle of the photograph are two small grave markers (sadly long gone) for Arabella Mann and Mary Jane Whitehouse, both of whom died before the pyramid was installed. Their graves mark the front edge of the Society’s land. Their names were inscribed on the pyramid, and we will come to their stories in a later chapter. At the bottom of the hill was the cemetery office and superintendent’s house where John Adam Bohnet once lived. As cemetery superintendent he had enjoyed this large house as his home when the Watch Tower Society owned the whole cemetery. In front of the house in the photograph are several large grave markers. As noted earlier, these are not graves, but sample monuments for purchase.

The previous chapter outlined how the cemetery as a whole, including the superintendent’s house, had been sold to the adjoining Northside Catholic cemetery at the end of 1917. At the time the pyramid was installed, United Cemeteries was obviously still a very active concern.

In the 1920 census a family named Schweiger lived in the cemetery house. Frank Schweiger (aged 43 in 1920) was President of United Cemeteries, his brother Matthew (aged 51) was Cemetery Ground Keeper.

Some of the family were still there twenty years later in the 1940 census. Frank was now listed as cemetery foreman. When the family died they were all buried in United Cemeteries.

The next home on the 1920 census schedule was also a cemetery house, housing a family named Brunner. The father Joseph (aged 56) was a gravedigger, his son George (aged 32) a cemetery laborer, another son Aloysius (aged 26) was an undertaker’s chauffeur, and daughter Mary (aged 22) worked as a cemetery office clerk. It was a real family business. There was also a young son, Joseph (aged 14) with as yet no occupation. However, following the trail through the years young Joseph grew up to become Superintendent of the Northside Catholic cemetery in 1954.

Although they were listed next on the 1920 Cemetery Lane census, the paucity of houses strongly suggests the Brunners were further along the road alongside the adjoining Catholic Cemetery. Being much larger than United Cemeteries, it needed a larger staff. The whole family were buried there when the time came.

So although owned by Northside since late 1917, United Cemeteries continued as a separate business for decades.

Returning to the special plot in United Cemeteries that the Watch Tower Society retained, for over one hundred years, the main center of attention was the seven feet high pyramid in the middle of the site. The attention was not always welcomed. There was evidence on one side of the pyramid where something akin to a sledgehammer and a pyramid side once met. The monument was broken into on two known occasions. Following more extensive vandalism in 2020 the decision was eventually taken to have the structure removed. This story, an end of an era, is told in this book in chapter 14.

Here in this chapter we will consider how the whole idea of such a monument ever came about, and how it was executed.

Pyramid symbols were featured in the theology of the Bible Students from the start. The famous Chart of the Ages in Food for Thinking Christians (1881) and then The Divine Plan of the Ages (1886) used the symbol as an illustration of unique persons and groups within each Age, with their different roles and status. In addition, chapter 2 described how the Great Pyramid of Giza was understood to be God’s stone witness, not to replace, but to support scripture. If you were going to have a monument, this was a logical shape to choose in that era. It was not a grave marker, there was nobody buried inside it or beneath it; rather it was a communal monument for the whole site. Much as a war memorial records all the names of those remembered, so the pyramid sides were to record the names of all those buried on site. However, as noted in an earlier chapter, only nine names were ever recorded. We will consider the history of all nine persons in later chapters. But that had been the original intention.

The idea of a pyramid monument on site can be laid at the door of John Adam Bohnet, the cemetery superintendent of United Cemeteries. He suggested it to CTR in 1912. This was observed when the monument was installed. We will come to the account later in this chapter, but it was noted in The New Era Enterprise newspaper for February 10, 1920.

The same account was supported in the official program for the Watch Tower Society’s annual meeting held in Pittsburgh in October 1921. It gave a few more details:

Some have queried Bohnet’s claim of CTR’s approval for his design. Personally, the writer has no reason to doubt Bohnet’s word as such – in his published writings over nearly 30 years he comes over as an honest, sincere man; although the actual size and scale of the project may have grown a bit since CTR’s demise. CTR had requested in his will that his funeral service be very simple and inexpensive; so the finished edifice, even if for all the Bethel family, may have evolved into something a little more elaborate than a passing rough sketch from 1912.

Bible Students received more information about the plans when they attended conventions in Pittsburgh in January 1918 and 1919.

The 15 January 1918 St. Paul Enterprise reported on the convention held over January 2-6, 1918, and noted that “the special monument which has been ordered by the Society [for the cemetery], is not yet completed, so none had the privilege of viewing it.”

By the time of the 1919 convention report (covering 2-5 January 1919) a five foot deep concrete foundation was in place, reinforced with strands of barbed wire, constructed by Bohnet. Visitors were taken to a nearby marble works to see the work in progress. It was natural that as well as new cemeteries springing up off what was now called Cemetery Lane, some companies would also provide monuments to order. An artist’s impression of the finished production showed a pyramid with open books on its four sides, the pages designed to receive the names of those buried there. These would be headquarters staff (from “Bethel”) and traveling ministers (“Pilgrims”) along with their families. A space for J F Rutherford was already earmarked.

From the 1919 convention report

The 1919 report said they had been trying to obtain the right material for about five years (or since 1914) and the pink granite eventually used came all the way from Marble Falls City in Texas. The idea of trying to source appropriate materials since 1914 has a ring of truth about it because the first Bible Student burial took place on the special section of the Society’s cemetery site in December that year. The deceased, 25 year old Grace Mundy, was buried in one of the four corners of the site. Subsequent burials (apart from CTR’s own) followed this pattern, almost as if they were marking out the extremities of the site and working from the outside inwards when using it.

According to the Donatelli Company which took over the Cemetery Lane site in the 1960s, the original company chosen to build the pyramid was the Kohler Company, founded by Eugene Adrian Kohler (1865-1922). Eugene was born in Germany, came to America in 1892, was married in 1893, and was finally naturalised as an American citizen in 1917. He and his wife Lena had six children including Edmund Kohler (1894-1971), who joined the family business and eventually took it over. In the 1910 census Eugene is listed as Proprietor, Monumental Works, in Cemetery Lane.

Eugene died comparatively young from pulmonary tuberculosis, directly linked to his work as a stone cutter. He was buried in 1922 in the former Northside Catholic Cemetery, now known as the Christ Our Redeemer Cemetery, on Cemetery Lane. But it was Eugene who cut the stones for the pyramid. His son, Edmund, then sandblasted the sides to carve out the names of those buried nearby. Edmund’s history is summed up in census returns from 1920 through to 1950. In 1920 he is stone cutter (monumental works), 1930 he is letter carver (monument), 1940 he is letter cutter (stone cutting company), and 1950 he is proprietor (monumental business).

Picture of Edmund from 1927 newspaper and an undated business card. The business is described as: Edmund Kohler, Modern Cemetery Memorials.

When Edmund died, his obituary in the Tampa Tribune (Florida), 25 January 1971, stated the company’s title was Memorial Art Works.

In the mid-1960s, Edmund retired and the site was sold to another company, Fred Donatelli Cemetery Memorials. As noted above, they still operate there and we will come back to them in chapter 14.

Returning to the artist’s impression in the 1919 convention report, the design was to change slightly in its final execution. However, it had its four sides, each with an open book (a Bible) showing two pages. Each book had spaces for 48 names over the two pages, giving the total of 192 names; that is, if the site had been used as originally intended. Above each book was a cross and crown motif and the inscriptions noted in the Enterprise cutting above.

The four sides leaned toward the center and were anchored in place by a capstone. The edges were all designed to be sealed making a hollow whole.

The installation of the pyramid was completed in time to be given a full write-up in the 20 February 1920 issue of the Enterprise. The front page article was entitled “The Pyramid Monument on the Bethel Burial Lots.”

The account started with some facts and figures about the monument. It was made of Texas red granite that was “extremely hard to cut and is imperishable.” It measured “nine feet at its squared base and seven feet high in the clear from the ground surface.” A headstone for CTR made from Barre granite was shortly to be installed. In the sparsely populated area of the day, the monument was “visible for miles.”

A particular feature was the idea of buried treasure. The Enterprise story related:

“Within the monument is a hollowed stone, which contains a copy of all the Society’s literature, photographs of the Pastor, a copy of the Society’s charter and other data which some day in the not far distant future may perchance come to light, now effectively sealed up.”

Sadly, history would find that “imperishable” and “impregnable” do not mean the same thing.

What happened to it years later is detailed in a later chapter.

The article concluded with a fanciful comment that probably reflected how many people felt at the time:

“The Bethel lot will be sacred in the future when other lots in the place will be forgotten. And who knows the Ancient Worthies may someday stand reverently before the monument with bowed heads and read the names traced thereon!”

In reality, the Ancient Worthies would have had some difficulty. The years were not kind to the pyramid. The red coloration disappeared. The weathering of the monument and the way the light hit it made decipherment difficult. For example, an internet search of memorial inscriptions for this cemetery only yielded about three names for the pyramid as recorded by volunteer transcribers. If you go back to 1967, there was an article by George Swetnam entitled “A Man and His Monument” in the Family Magazine section of the Pittsburgh Press (25 June 1967, page 7). This had a line drawing of the pyramid and the writer listed eight names. But Swetnam was obviously struggling. Writing about CTR, he noted:

Of the seven buried, as he had planned, at least five were Pittsburghers, Arabella Mann, Chester Elledge, Grace Mound, H.L. Addington and Flora Cole. Mary J. Whitehouse and Lorena Russell (no known kin to the Pastor) may have Been but this is uncertain. Addington died youngest at 35, Miss Cole, eldest, at 78.

Grace Mound has to be an error for Grace Mundy. More curious, Swetnam mentions the name of Chester Ellidge. That can only be a drastic misreading for John Coolidge, which is surprising since a proper grave marker still survives on site for him. In the light of subsequent events, it is also unfortunate that Swetnam reminded the world there was something worth stealing inside the pyramid.

If we go right back to the February 1920 Enterprise article, it also lists eight names carved into the pyramid sides, but with the expectation of many more to follow. 

As noted above, in reality there were nine names in total, but that was all. Swetnam missed the name John Perry, and The Enterprise had an editorial glitch, because their missing name, Lorena Russell, was buried there back in December 1915.

Likely for reasons of space, some names on the pyramid sides were abbreviated with just surname and initials. However, the full names of the nine are:

North Face

   Arabella Mann

   Mary Jane Whitehouse

 

South Face

   Charles Taze Russell

   John Milton Coolidge

   (This name was easily missed by visitors because it was nearly at ground level)

 

East Face

   Grace Mundy

   Laurena May Russell

   John Perry

   Henry Lawrence Addington

   Flora Jane Cole

 

West Face

   (No inscriptions)

The next two chapters will discuss what is known about these people, and some have interesting histories and connections. For now we can dispel one potential for speculation: Laurena May Russell was not related to CTR.

However, that was it. For all the hype in the 1919 convention report and the 1920 Enterprise article, all the names were of people who had actually died before the pyramid was erected. No further names were ever added; and only two more interments took place until the 1940s. The site basically was just left fallow. Bible Students who left the Watch Tower Society would hold memorial services at CTR’s grave in conjunction with annual reunion conventions in Pittsburgh, but other visitors would be few. One dryly remarked in a 1929 convention report: “Either the friends have not been dying or the plan has been changed.”

The reason for the project’s abandonment is quite easy to see. When the construction of the monument got underway, J F Rutherford was in prison. Once he was released, the headquarters that had temporarily transferred back to Pittsburgh now returned to their proper home in Brooklyn. Pittsburgh may have been CTR’s original home, but it was no longer the Society’s home. Shipping bodies from Brooklyn all the way to Pittsburgh would be a nine hour rail journey and could be expensive. Also, Pittsburgh was unlikely to be near surviving relatives. The Brooklyn Bethel family soon had other more practical arrangements in New York on Staten Island. It made far better sense for headquarters staff and their families who died to be buried there. We will review these replacement arrangements in Chapter 15.

In addition, the concept of a pyramid as a suitable symbol was dropped by the Society in 1928.

Over the years of virtual disuse, some of the small headstones for others named on the pyramid disappeared; either through wear and tear, vandalism, or even just the encroachment of grass over them. Whatever the reason, only one early stone (apart from CTR’s) survives today. As noted above, it was for John Coolidge. It is a curiosity, because the stated plan was for all the markers (apart from CTR’s) to be of white marble, 12 inches across and 6 inch high, and very close to the ground. The Enterprise newspaper explained:

Early photographs of the markers for Arabella Mann and Mary Jane Whitehouse (below) show this was done, although the stones may have been a little larger to allow the base to be sunk into the ground, rather than just laid flat on the surface.

However, Coolidge’s marker appears to be higher out of the ground.

It may be that the stone for John Coolidge has risen or the earth has sunk in this area over the last hundred years. Because this marker stands out more, maybe that is why it has survived. We will discuss the history of John Coolidge in Chapter 10.

Grave Matters

A new book has recently been published on the United Cemeteries, entitled GRAVE MATTERS. It is 170 pages and fully illustrated.

Some of the research first appeared online over a decade ago. Details of the book can be found on the Lulu site. Just visit Lulu Books, and specify LULU BOOKSTORE. The usual URL is: https://www.lulu.com/shop

Then in the search box type in GRAVE MATTERS. Just be careful because several other writers have used this title, but it should be obvious which one is the history book, with its pale blue cover (above) and description.

The blurb for the book is as follows:

The unusual story of the Watch Tower Society's own graveyard in Ross Township. Originally 90 acres, now just a small area remains associated with Watch Tower, including the grave of Charles Taze Russell. The account includes Russell's funeral, the tale of his sister who is buried alongside him, the Miracle Wheat episode (which was grown on site) and the background of the names engraved on the sides of a pyramid monument in the center of the site until recent years. Also, the strange story of "treasure" buried in the pyramid back in 1920 and what happened to it? Who would have thought that a small piece of land just 64 feet square would provide so much history.

Robison to Weber - 1912

This postcard above is from 1912 and was written in German by Frederick Robison to Adolf Weber during a return trip to America after a tour in Europe. (Image supplied by Franco).

A closer look at the message is below:

 

It reads:

"Lieber Bruder Weber: grüsse aus Irland. Die Reise des Comitees ist jetzt heimwärts gerichtet. Bald sind wir da. Deiner in Christo J.H.Robinson"

English translation:

Dear Brother Weber, greetings from Ireland, the journey of the Committee is now directed homeward, and soon we will be there, Yours in Christ, F H Robison.

(Editorial note: this was the return journey from the tour made by C T Russell and others investigating foreign missions. See Watch Tower for April 15, 1912. Weber had once worked as a gardener for CTR in Pittsburgh, afterward spearheading the work in his native Switzerland and Robison was to be one of the Brooklyn eight imprisoned in 1918.)

 

A Thin Seventh Volume

One edition of Studies in the Scriptures that is particularly collectable is the 7^th volume The Finished Mystery in its printings from 1927 onward. This was much thinner than previous editions, because half of the original contents were now omitted.

The forward in this printing is particularly interesting because it only mentions the work of Pastor Russell and C J Woodworth.

The original full-size 7^th volume not only covered the book of Revelation, as compiled by Clayton J Woodworth, but also the book of Ezekiel as compiled by George H Fisher. Fisher and Woodworth had been long time friends and worked on the project in the first half of 1917. Both were imprisoned as part of the Brooklyn Eight in 1918-1919. However, things changed in the 1920s and Fisher became distanced from the IBSA. (See the letter J F Rutherford wrote him as reproduced in full in the Golden Age for March 25, 1925, page 409.)

Fisher died in July 1926 and The New Era Enterprise carried a brief obituary in its issue for August 1926. His work on Ezekiel was now omitted from the 7^th volume. However, the whole volume was soon to be replaced by five new books - two on Revelation (Light volumes 1 and 2 in 1930) and three on Ezekiel (Vindication, volumes 1-3 in 1931-1932).