I will ask others to fill in the blanks here but the cemetery was started with the death of, I believe it was Arthur Mangum, the small son of Albert and Ellen Mangum. I think that he was first. I believe that he died of diptheria when it hit the valley. Grandpa Mangum built the coffin from materials that were dropped off at the end of the road. Grandma lined it with cloth that she had. They carried the coffin up the hill from their home and buried their son. I believe that this is the first person buried there but will check the dates to make sure.
There are essentially 3 families and a few "extra's" buried there. Grandpa and Grandma Mangum (will tell the story of Grandma Mangum later), two of their sons. These graves sit inside of an iron fence that someone at sometime constructed there. Then to the right of these graves, close to them, are the graves of 4 of the Ross children. These are the sons and daughters of George and Georgia Ross. George Ross was a cousin of Albert Mangum and good friend. Grandpa spent summers as a younger man with the Ross family in Rabbit Valley, Utah... they used to play "rabbit polo" in the summer as there were so many rabbits there. Also on that side of the cemetery, Myrtle Mangum's grave is located. Shirley was looking at the life stories and there should also be a Jesse who is Myrtle's brother there. These two individuals are cousins also. They died of diptheria while visiting the Mangums. And per Grandma Mangum's life story there should also be a grave of a Lizzie Clark (we think this is the right last name). We didn't see that grave. So there is more sleuthing to do to find the rest of the graves. It is possible by the description in Grandma's story that Lizzie's grave is inside the iron fence with the rest of the Mangum family. We will have to see if we can locate it.
We found several graves and Shirley and Vi made a list of these when we went there with the brothers and sisters. Ben and I found a couple more that were lost in the brush that I think we missed earlier. We also made a list. If Shirley or Vi have their list we could compare and see if we have them all.
The other end of the cemetery, to the left of the Mangum's, there are graves of the Waterman family. According to our cousin Edna Baugh, she recalls Grandma talking about them as family friends. So I suspect that they lived near by. There are multiple last names, Miller, Flemming and Masterson but they all tie to the Watermans. Masterson is the step son of Lorenzo Waterman, from his wife's first marriage. Miller and Flemming are both married daughters of the Watermans. Forest Miller, the husband of one of the daughters, is buried there. Glennie Flemming died at about age 29, if I'm remembering correctly, so I suspect that her husband remarried and is likely is buried elsewhere with his second wife.
The cemetery sits in the middle of a large housing development. You have to know where to find it to get there. It really needs cleaned up. There is a lot of brush on it, some fallen trees and a dead tree or two. We want to clean it up and plant wild flowers there. But...what is cool is even though it is surrounded by houses, when Ben and I went there a couple years ago there was a small red fox just lying there in the cemetery. He seemed to be at peace. He ran away but we got fairly close to him. It was cool.
It was initially on the homestead of the Mangums. This was eventually sold to the Forest Service and became Forest Service land. Then with some trading of land, it was purchased by a company for development. They wanted to dig up the bodies and re-inter them elsewhere, but at that time Govenor Hanson who was a close family friend (The Hansons were neighbors to the Mangums for years), pushed through a bill in the Wyoming legislature that made this and one other family cemetery, permanent cemeteries that could not be disturbed nor could bodies be re-interred. So there it sits with condominiums and large homes all the way around it. It is who you know.....
Along that line, it was Forest Service land in 1968 when Grandma Mangum died and was no longer legal for her to be buried there--which was always her plan--to be buried next to her husband and two sons. A phone call to Senator Simpson (another close family friend and long time residents of Jackson Hole) solved the problem. He added an amendment to a bill going through Congress that explicitly gave permission to Ellen Mangum to be buried in that cemetery. Once again--it is who you know. But it was a great blessing.
There are so many stories and such a great heritage.
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