Here are a couple of historic postcards showing how this place looked sometime between 1895 and 1933 when the original hospital was torn down. Those trees are either larger, or many have died and their remains stick up here and there from the lake like swords hoping for a King Arthur.
There used to be a group of ‘Christian Indians’ located here before the decision to build a soldiers home here. But [according to the official history] they ‘left’. They were called the Muncies.
So when the old hospital was torn down in 1933 and they began excavating to build something else on the location they discovered a number of graves containing Muncie Indians. I suppose they pondered a while before deciding to bury them in a mass grave in the National Cemetery a quarter-mile away from here. It’s the only mass grave in that cemetery, so you could say those Muncies got special treatment.
I’ll be posting more about the various buildings, the cemetery, the ghost stories and the current population of old vets here. But first I wanted to convey that there really is a bit of a saga ……. it’s just not quite what a person might expect.
Thanks for the read.
Old Jules
So Far From Heaven 
Poor bastards. The Muncies. Horrible Irony that they should be “moved on” without mercy so they could build a HOSPITAL on the site. Surely employing them would have been more sensible. Looking forward to the saga! c
Thus far I haven’t found any details nor even references connecting the two events of the Muncies ‘leaving, and the bodies found. A bicentential program on video filmed in 1976 just goes into the history of the land the campus and cemetery sit on and mentions the Muncies lived here. Then, much later when they discuss tearing down the old hospital, they tell about finding the graves while excavating to build Building 122 on the site. And the burial. So maybe I’m assuming too much when I suspect there is a connection [and that there are probably more Muncie bodies scattered around located wherever they caught them.
It is true what they say about assumptions however the armies of the time violently relocated many tribes for less. My Dad used to say if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck it is probably a DUCK. Nice to chat again! c
Around here there are several hundred great big old ducks everyone but me calls geese. The fly off the lake and drop their digestive loads on the cars, these great big old ducks, and they pretty much walk like ducks. So I calls them ducks. Never heard anyone call those Muncies ducks though, nor geese, either. Thanks for the reply. They drops their digestive loads, I was going to say, as they circle around to land on frozen Lake Jeanette, or take off from it. Great big old ducks. People look funny at me when I say it, but that doesn’t deter me.
Looking forward to hearing more stories about the cemetery and the ghosts.
Thanks….. and thanks for the visit.
Glad to see you are back 🙂 I am planning to start printing in a week and a half. I will send you a copy of the first volume if you like.
Thanks. I’ll be interested in seeing it. Gracias, Old Jules