Missing headstone returns from Rock Falls, Illinois

The headstone of a man whose family helped start a Butler County school nearly a century ago was laid to rest Tuesday, decades after it went missing from an area cemetery.

Its recovery has not only provided closure for the family of Francis Marion Hendrix, it has helped them rediscover a part of their history that had been lost.

The original grave marker has spent the last few years in an evidence locker in Rock Falls, Illinois.

It made it home thanks to the dedicated efforts of police officers there and in Poplar Bluff, the help of a local businessman with an interest in geneology and a little luck.

The stone, which is engraved with the image of an open book, was found in the basement of a Rock Falls home and turned over to police there in 2013, explained Eddy Justice, who helped locate its owner. How the headstone arrived in Rock Falls remains a mystery.

Officers were able to use an online search tool to narrow the grave of F.M. Hendrix Sr., 1843-1920, to the Poplar Bluff area.

They reached out to Poplar Bluff Police Chief Danny Whiteley, who then contacted Justice.

Justice didn’t know it at the time, but the stone belonged to the great-grandfather of a man he’s known for the past 16 years.

Eddy Justice (right) and Larry Dare place the returned stone on his Dare’s great-grandfather’s grave. DAR/Paul Davis

“I’ve always been interested in geneology and family history,” Justice said Tuesday morning, shortly before meeting members of the family at Black Creek Cemetery, where Hendrix was buried. “When I got the information that this headstone had been displaced, I just wanted to get it back to where it belonged. Family heritage is important.”

Justice researched Ancestry.com and found a family tree that included Hendrix. It also included a short biography with a list of descendants.

The name of one of the granddaughters was familiar, the late Opal Hendrix Dare. Opal is the mother of Larry Dare, who attends Temple Baptist Church with Justice.

“This just happened to be a byproduct of the research I do on geneology. I would have never expected that I would know their descendants,” Justice said.

Larry Dare was unaware the stone had gone missing at some point in the past. It was replaced later by someone in the family, but he doesn’t know who.

A lot of the history concerning his great-grandfather had been lost to his family until it was rediscovered by Justice, Dare said.

DAR/Paul Davis

It’s something that he now plans on sharing with his two children and three grandchildren, the great-great-great-grandchildren of Hendrix.

Hendrix and his wife, Zelinda, came to Butler County from Kentucky in 1886 by steamboat. They had a few personal belongings and $10 in cash.

Hendrix and his 15-year-old son Edward walked five miles each day to a brick yard, where they made 50 cents each for the work. This history was later recorded by Opal’s sister, Ruth Hendrix Hendrickson.

It was Francis Hendrix’s second son, James, who donated an acre for the Black Creek School sometime prior to 1928. Both Dare and his mother would attend the school, along with other members of the family.

But for James, at the age of 10, there was little time for school while his father and brother worked in the brick yard, his daughter Ruth would later write. The second eldest, he was responsible for most of the farm work at home.

Her father educated himself in the evenings by lamp and firelight, she wrote in the history that was rediscovered by Justice.

James was later able to attend college in Cape Girardeau and become a teacher. He was one four sons born to Hendrix who would become teachers. Four other boys became ministers.

Ruth died in 2012, at the age of 101, according to Ruth’s daughter, Darla Starling. Starling doesn’t know how the history came to be posted online either.

Like often happens with families, Starling said, the children didn’t realize the importance of this information when those who remembered it were here to share it.

While the story behind the book engraved on Hendrix’s original gravestone remains lost, as well as how the marker traveled to Rock Falls, this story will now be shared with Dare’s own children.

Dare was there Tuesday when the stone, which was mailed to Poplar Bluff, was set back on his great-grandfather’s grave. Terry Dare, Larry's brother, also helped with arrangements for the return of the headstone.

“It’s just nice for it to be set there in front of the other marker that’s there,” said Dare.

Larry Dare reflects a he kneels next to his great grandfather’s grave, where the original headstone recently was returned. DAR/Paul Davis

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Editor's note: This story has been updated with a correction to the last name on the headstone and that Terry Dare also helped with the arrangements for the return of the headstone.