PREPARING TO LEARN FUNERAL HOME HISTORY

The history of the funeral home in the mid western United States of America is one of evolution and innovation. The reason we will examine the mid western historical development of funeral homes is because it is the geographical arena where the most dynamic changes occurred in the most concentrated frame of funeral service and practice in the course of our nation’s history. While there have been several years, or even a couple of decades at a time when the traditions of the American funeral remained unchanged, the owners and operators of funeral home establishments were continually examining new possibilities and ways to better serve their clientele.

First let’s define what we mean by the “mid western” United States. For the sake of our historical examination, let’s define the geographical region that spans from the western side of the Smokey Mountains westward to the Mississippi River. Then we will draw a line across the northern borders of Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi and look at the territory extending all the way north until reaching the Canadian border. It would not be unheard of to also include states like Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa and Minnesota in this discussion. The stories of how the funeral homes in those states were established, is not much different than those of their near eastern neighbors.

As the population of the nation during the 19^th century explored and moved into the western half of the land mass we know as the continental United States, the businesses that these settlers had become familiar with back east were established in similar fashion to meet the needs of the new communities they now lived in. The business of “taking care of the dead” was also a very necessary business to be established. That is why we can include into our historical survey these States west of the Mississippi River also.

Along with the development of the funeral home, we must not forget the suppliers of merchandise, funeral specific supplies and materials, and rolling stock (funeral transportation). This aspect of the mid western funeral home history amplifies itself in the same geographical locations that we have established.

At one time during the majority of the 20^th century someone could draw a two hundred mile square parameter around the eastern half of Indiana and the central and western parts of Ohio and make an amazing parallel historical discovery. The vast majority of the caskets buried and hearses used by funeral homes throughout the entire United States were manufactured within that geographic area.

Hearse manufacturers bearing the names of Sayers & Scovill and its successor Hess & Eisenhardt were located in Cincinnati, Ohio. The A. J. Miller Co. of Bellefontaine, Ohio would eventually merge with the Meteor Motor Car Company and form the Miller-Meteor Division of the Wayne Corporation in Piqua, Ohio in the mid 1950s. The Superior Coach Corporation was located in Lima, Ohio. The Flxible Company (that’s spelled correctly) was located in Loudonville, Ohio. These companies were all located within a comfortable day’s drive of each other in the State of Ohio.

Casket companies such as Batesville, Aurora, Springfield Metallic, Crane & Breed and Astral Industries (to name a few) were all located in the southern Indiana and in the southwestern region of Ohio. They shipped their products by railroad, truck and boat out to the entire nation. These companies and others like them were all very progressive in their approach to manufacturing caskets for the funeral home industry.

Even embalming chemicals and other mortuary supplies found their roots in the same  geographical regions. The Champion Chemical Company was founded in Springfield, Ohio (just west of Columbus, Ohio) in 1878. The Frigid Fluid Company, located outside of Chicago, Illinois in Northlake, has not only manufactured embalming chemicals, but has also produced a vast line of innovative mortuary equipment over the years. The Ferno-Washington Company located in Wilmington, Ohio has been manufacturing mortuary equipment, specializing in cots and preparation room tables for many decades. These companies and many others in the great mid west have accounted for a large portion of the mortuary supplies and equipment manufactured and used in the United States.

And so as the funeral home evolved historically and sought new innovations and technologies, their suppliers were needed even more. History indicates that they set up shop in obvious close vicinity to these funeral homes so they could fulfill the needs of the ever changing and developing funeral home business.

It was a cooperative team of suppliers and practitioners that created a solid foundation for funeral homes to be transformed into better equipped and better supplied facilities to serve the needs of grieving families for over a century.

FROM EMBALMERS TO FUNERAL HOMES

To understand the history of the American funeral home one must understand the history of mortuary embalming and the care of the dead in our nation. Prior to the Civil War arterial embalming for preservation was virtually unheard of. There were no mortuaries or dedicated businesses strictly designed for the care of the dead. Embalming might have been practiced by some medical doctors on anatomical specimens and even an occasional political dignitary, but it was generally not thought of as a marketable service. As the industrial age grew during and around the time of the Civil War, so did the need for new technologies and services.

The increasing national press coverage of the Civil War also sparked a need to bring the dead home from their various battles for proper burial. This in turn created a market for the primitive arterial embalming processes. Individual embalmers (mostly surgeons who had some education in human anatomy) became the marketable service. Because of the increasing demand they would train their assistants and often these assistants would eventually become practicing embalmers on their own.

Pre Civil War government records indicate the body of President William Henry Harrison was embalmed in 1841 by a Washington DC undertaker named John Williams. Another record indicates that a New York undertaker named John Patten embalmed the body of Martin Van Buren in 1862. Still other historical records tell us of another embalmer man named Dr. Thomas H. Holmes. Dr. Holmes, a native of New York practiced his embalming skills in Washington DC during the Civil War. He eventually returned to New York and established his own pharmacy where he sold his own brand of embalming fluid and a version of “root beer” that he had created.

While embalming may have been practiced occasionally outside the realm of anatomical education, prior to the Civil War, most funeral directors (undertakers) outside of the major metropolitan areas had never heard of arterial embalming or made the service available. The Civil War and particular the press coverage of the funeral of Abraham Lincoln changed all of that.

Slowly over the next half century and into the first two decades of the 20^th century the desire by the general public for this service drew the undertakers of that era into the practice and use of the evolving art and science of embalming for preservation. They would often travel to the larger cities where classes would be held to teach these various mortuary practices. These classes or seminars would last anywhere from a few hours to a couple of days, depending on who the instructor was. Often the instructor would be promoting his own formula of embalming fluid and injection equipment.

These educational events gradually brought embalming into the public’s perception as a marketable service. After the beginning of the 20^th century, embalming was advertised in funeral home handbills and newspaper ads along with the other services and merchandise that a particular funeral home would promote.