Roadside Crosses and 285 fatalities

I am doing some research on the roadside crosses and fatalities on Hwy 285.
If you know of someone who has been killed on Hwy 285. please post here or PM me.

Does anyone know anything about the 2 crosses that are just outside the Horn Cemetery.
There are no markings on them.

The story I know - and the one related by Harold Warren - about the Horn Cemetery is that it was originally part of the Deer Valley Stage Stop (now Dozier's Deer Valley Ranch), built by John Parmalee (eldest son of George Parmalee, for whom Parmalee Gulch was named) in 1866. The legend of the cemetery is that a stage passenger got into a fight while staying overnight there and was fatally shot. He staggered out into the night and didn't make it very far. In the morning, they buried him where he fell. He may have been Bob Kelso, who was the first documented grave there in 1875. Other graves were later added around his, somewhat casually and many times with no permission. The land for the cemetery was deeded to Park County in 1887. In 1976, the county was reminded that they owned it, and they began to maintain it, including having it surveyed and fenced. The highway had been widened by then and two unmarked, unidentified graves are located outside the fenced area in the highway right-of-way.

Thank you so much pchistory for that information.
I may have to tap your knowledge base a lot in the next few months.
So...we have no idea who those unmarked graves belong to?
If you have any information about any of the roadside crosses that are up and down Hwy 285....I would appreciate some information.

Becky wrote: Thank you so much pchistory for that information.
I may have to tap your knowledge base a lot in the next few months.
So...we have no idea who those unmarked graves belong to?
If you have any information about any of the roadside crosses that are up and down Hwy 285....I would appreciate some information.

As far as I know, they're unidentified graves that were there prior to the widening of 285 through that stretch in the sixties. It wasn't uncommon for pioneers to bury their dead - many times children who died of smallpox and other diseases - in the nearest "burial ground". Much of the time they moved on, so had no interest in marking the grave other than perhaps by a simple wooden cross.

There's a grave somewhere at Santa Maria of a little girl, Ida Burt - the daughter of the original homesteader there - who died at the age of 9 in 1875. Her sister, Ella, wrote in her memoirs many years later that they buried her "in a little park above the grove" next to a big rock on which her father carved her initials. Her parents were so heartbroken that they sold the place to David Cassell ("for $300 and a good team") and moved on. I haven't yet been able to locate it.

The crosses outside of Horn Cemetery are made of metal. Kind of an odd shape to them.

I am creating a database of fatalities on Hwy 285 so please....If you know of someone who has been lost on Hwy 285....please post here or pm me.

In the Glacier National Park, on the Indian reservation, a white cross is planted at the location of each fatal accident. They are stark monuments to the numerous deaths.
Such a program would be very useful on the 285 corridor. If a white cross of uniform construction was placed at the location of each fatality, the government would have to make this highway more safe. The number of deaths on 285 from C470 to Buena Vista is staggering but unnoticed because of the lack of news coverage or tally.

I have started a memorial thread here in the campfire and will add to it as I gain additional names and information.
The people who have died on Hwy 285 had families.
They were wives, husbands, mothers, fathers, grandparents, brothers, sisters, children and friends.
They have names. They are not just statistics.
Please drive carefully my friends.
( Most of the names on the list died in the last 2 years)

I believe that the white crosses just outside of the Elkhorn Cemetery and those inside are veterans grave markers, WWI and WWII.

Thx for the info Major bean. I would like to give those graves a name and story.