Great grand parents . . .

I never knew my mother's grandparents.  Albert and Mary Paulsen homesteaded in North Dakota and came to this country from Denmark.  After being in North Dakota for about 20 years, in 1902, they decided to move to the Kalispell area.  The older of their 12 children stayed in North Dakota and the younger ones went with them.  My grandmother, mom's mother, Hannah Paulsen was one of the younger girls.  My mom's mother also died before I was born so I never knew her either.

While building a large home in the Kalispell area for his family, Albert Paulsen was killed in an accident while removing tree stumps from the area around the new house.  That was in 1905.  He was buried in Kalispell.  His wife, Mary, returned to North Dakota with the younger children where they grew up.  When she passed in 1940, she was buried in Kalispell with him.  Growing up I never knew they were buried there.  I am not sure my mother knew it until she was in her later years.  She knew they had lived in Kalispell and she knew where the "in town" house was and where the house was that was being built.  Those stories she had heard from her mother.  Mom was 12 when her mother passed and she had limited contact with her grandmother.

When I was in Kalispell last week, I took an afternoon to go to the Conrad Memorial Cemetery to see if I could find the graves of my great grandparents.  I had no idea where to even begin to look.  I thought there would be someone there with records.  Nope - that was not to be.  But I did look it up on "Findagrave.com" and found a picture.  Armed with that, finding the actual marker was easy.  The cemetery was founded in 1902 by the Conrad family and the marker was in the oldest section.  This is is a gorgeous cemetery.

I am glad I found these markers.  It was a cool, rainy day - just right for connecting.