Catharine and Jacob Kidney stones, Green Lawn Cemetery, Columbus. Photo by Amy Johnson Crow, 12 Oct 2013.
It was probably impolite of me, but when I saw these tombstones at Green Lawn Cemetery in Columbus, I giggled. (Quietly, of course. I was in a cemetery, after all.) When I saw them, it occurred to me what these are: the Kidney stones. 
You might have already seen this on the NSTS Facebook page, where I shared it for a Saturday evening chuckle. (Apologies to any Kidney descendants.) But I couldn’t let Jacob and Catharine just stay names on their tombstones.
Jacob and Catharine were born in New Jersey. They were in Franklin County, Ohio, living the 1st ward of Columbus by 1840. They were still there in 1850. Jacob listed his occupation as “carpenter,” though he was 82 years old. Their census entry has an usual note: “Married 60 years.”
Jacob Kidney household, 1850 U.S. census, Columbus, Franklin County, Ohio, p. 393B.
There is some ambiguity about where Jacob was originally buried. Unlike Catharine, there is no burial record for Jacob at Green Lawn Cemetery. Donald Schlagel, noted Columbus historian, theorizes that many of those without burial cards at Green Lawn were originally buried in one of the Columbus city cemeteries and then reinterred at Green Lawn when the city cemeteries were closed. (It’s also possible that if Jacob was originally interred at one of the city cemeteries, he was never actually reinterred… I’ll let you do the math on that one.)
Catharine’s father’s name was Henry Jacob, per her cemetery record.
Jacob’s will, written in 1843 and probated in 1854, lists the following:
- wife Catherine
- son John
- daughter Ann Maria’s heirs
- daughter Rachel, wife of Joseph Styler
- daughter Sarah, wife of Asher Jacobs
- daughter Esther, wife of Andrew Little
- son Henry
I don’t know what other stories Jacob and Catharine have. But I do know that they gave me a story about the time I found “Kidney stones” in the cemetery.
References:
- “Abstracts of Wills, Franklin County, Ohio” in Ohio Source Records From the Ohio Genealogical Society Quarterly. Baltimore: Clearfield, 2007. (Found on Google Books.)
- Catherine Kidney burial record. Green Lawn Cemetery Burials, Columbus, Ohio, 1848 to 1981. Letter K.
- Jacob Kidney household. 1840 U.S. census. 1st ward, Columbus, Franklin County, Ohio. Page 1.
- Jacob Kidney household. 1850 U.S. census. 1st ward, Columbus, Franklin County, Ohio. Page 353B.
- Schlegel, Donald M. The City of Columbus Cemeteries. Columbus: Columbus History Service, 1985. (Found on GenealogyBug.net.) [Jacob Kidney’s entry is on page 129.]
