Odd Fellows Cemetery

Nearly forgotten on the outskirts of Granite City, Illinois, is the Haunted Odd Fellows Cemetery.  For decades, this cemetery lay in ruin, with many of its beautiful monuments toppled and overgrown.  My first visit to the Odd Fellows Cemetery was over twenty years ago.  Then the area was so overgrown that the only way we could find the cemetery was by the wrought-iron arch marking the entrance.   Over the past few years, a concerted effort has been made to clear the overgrowth and maintain the cemetery.  Unfortunately, many of the beautiful monuments still lie toppled and broken.   During my last visit, I was shocked to see that many of the smaller headstones were cast behind a tree, meaning these graves will remain forever unmarked, and the names of those interred would be known only to time.  

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The spirit of Lucinda Irish supposedly haunts the graveyard; her grave is the first monument you see as you approach the cemetery.   In the late 1940’s a subdivision was going to be built in the area.  The old dirt road leading to the cemetery was paved with asphalt.  The builders planned to build houses on one side of the cemetery and relocated the headstones, but apparently the graves were never moved.  The wrought-iron arch was moved from its original entry point, where the old dirt road ended, to its current location next to the Irish Family monument.  Once the cemetery was desecrated, plans for the new subdivision fell through.  The desecration of her family’s graves was said to have awakened the spirit of Lucinda Irish.  Lucinda now roams the cemetery at night, screaming at anyone who dares to enter.

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Since the cemetery is now being maintained, sightings of Lucinda Irish have started to dissipate.  Maybe her spirit agrees with the recent attempts to clean up the cemetery, or maybe her spirit grows weary of the failed attempts to protect her family’s final resting place.