Tombstone in Ohio town is a mystery

ST. JOSEPH, TENN. - Mandy Storer is looking for answers to a question that she never dreamed of asking.

"We have a tombstone and we're looking for the grave it goes to," said Storer, communications director for Goshen, Ohio.

The problem: The tombstone belongs on the grave of a man who died in 1922 and is buried in St. Joseph, Tenn.

For the past several weeks, Storer has been trying to find anyone who knows anything about Lester Gaston Sr., whose tombstone was discovered in August under a mobile home in Goshen.

She said the Goshen Police Department searched area cemetery records and contacted surrounding communities to locate Gaston's grave but was not successful.

"Then it landed on my desk," Storer said. "To be honest, I've had so much fun tracking him all around. I felt like a detective."

Storer contacted the Ohio Department of Vital Statistics to get a death certificate but the record wasn't on file. She finally contacted the Ohio Historical Society and got Gaston's date and place of death, then learned more from genealogy Web sites.

"I found out he was 50, a salesman from Tennessee and was in Hamilton County, Ohio, at the time of his death, which was Jan. 9, 1922," Storer said. "Goshen is in Clermont County, so there's another question of how did the tombstone get here?"

Storer said according to Gaston's death certificate, he was buried in St. Joseph, Ala. But there is no St. Joseph in Alabama. She said she later learned there is a St. Joseph in Tennessee and that Gaston is buried there. No one she's found in St. Joseph, however, knows of Gaston.

"I've never heard of him. I've been here all my life," said Mary Evers, a St. Joseph resident.

Storer talked with officials in the Lawrence County Archives office and found out there are several unmarked graves in St. Joseph.

"(Gaston's grave) could very well be one of those," said Kathy Niedergeses, the director of the Lawrence County Archives.

Niedergeses said this is not the first time she has heard of someone trying to fit a tombstone to the appropriate grave.

"This summer, some ladies returned a tombstone that their ancestors had taken several years ago," she said.

Storer said she's asking for help.

"We're hoping someone there knows this man and knows where he's buried," Storer said. "We'd love to be able to get the tombstone to the grave where it belongs."

Storer can be reached at (513) 722-3400 or mandy.storer@goshen-oh.gov.

Tom Smith can be reached at 740-5757 or tom.smith@TimesDaily.com.