The Pilot News - Electrical update leads to unexpected find

Mosier explained that when he and father-in-law Gene Keller were preparing to get the wires connected outside (at the northeast corner of the north side of the property — just two feet from the side door) they never expected what happened next. “We were driving a ground spike, about an eight-foot copper rod to ground out the electric and about four inches down we hit something,” he said.
What at first was believed to be a large and unusually heavy rock was soon determined to be a stone … of sorts. “It turned out to be a headstone,” Mosier explained.
The tombstone is a simple rectangle with the only the name “Sample” engraved in it and the dates “1878-1900.”
The find, for the young couple, was a little unsettling and soon became “the talk of the (small) town” of Bourbon.
“We contacted the town,” Jennifer said, “because with the church (the rear of the Church of Christ) across the street, we just wondered if this (property) was part of a cemetery at one time.”
He wondered if it was a family plot that his home had been built on. More inquisitions revealed the house was recorded as being built 20 years after the death of the anonymous, 22-year-old “Sample.”
A trip to the Bourbon Public Library did not reveal much more about the property but did shed some light regarding cemeteries and the church. Historical books showed that the church was a branch of the Shiloh congregation that dissolved in 1850, reorganized in 1861 and that the followers built the building which still stands at Main and Liberty Streets in 1878 — the same year “Sample” was noted on the grave marker as being born.
Records also showed that at one time the church was a place of worship for the Presbyterian faith, but no record of any cemetery connected to the churches, faiths, lot or property could be found. Documentation of cemeteries in Bourbon, as far back as the early 1800s were found; some which still remain public, some that are now on private property and others that no longer exist were recorded – but nothing more could be determined about a burial ground at that location.
And while a couple referred to in cemetery records as “Mr. and Mrs. Sample” were found to have died in Bourbon (both) on April 17, 1930, neither could be connected to the property, the church or the Sample noted on the headstone found on the Mosier’s property.
At the Marshall County Historical Museum, more investigation into the search to find record of the anonymous Sample commenced. Historian Judy McCollough found records of one Samuel Sample, a man appointed to organize the area into what was to become Marshall County by surrounding counties’ commissioners in July of 1836 – but wasn’t likely to be connected to Bourbon’s “Sample.”
“They appointed people from other counties already established, Saint Joseph County, Elkhart County, LaPorte County, to apply to the state to set up a county government for Marshall County,” she explained. “We have a deed from when he (Samuel Sample) sold land in 1847. He had 80 acres in Greene and North Town-ships.”
McCollough said it was highly unlikely that an unearthed cemetery remain-ed under the Mosier’s home and offered another alternative reason for the stone being there. “Sometimes when a person dies, and then another dies in that same family, they get a new stone with both names,” she said. “Then, you have this stone you paid for and it happens sometimes that maybe the people take it home. They paid for it, so they want to keep it and they don’t need it at the cemetery.”
Fellow historian and assistant Karin Rettinger (who also is integral in the area’s annual cemetery tours) agreed. “It’s doubtful that someone buried their family there because there were several cemeteries already established at that time,” she said. “They could have, but it would have been illegal,” which would have given no good reason to display the fact with a tombstone on the offender’s property.
Both women also agreed that the stone could simply be what it clearly reads: a sample … works of a craftsman that wanted to show his wares. But if so, why such a simple design, a plain white rectangle that didn’t even offer a first name, only a date of a young adult to reflect the laborer’s talents and abilities?
Township Trustee Roger Schori, who maintains the townships burial grounds, was also stumped by the artifact’s excavation at the Mosier property.
Whether it’s a family keepsake, a sample to show to customers, a misplaced stone or whether there is another reason the stone was planted at the site may never be revealed, but one thing is for sure: its find sure has Bourbonites wondering about the “mystery of the excavated tombstone” like a Hardy Boys or Nancy Drew thriller of old.