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Family Tree #5: Muscotah Cemetery Multi-Cache

Hidden : 2/29/2016
Difficulty:
3.5 out of 5
Terrain:
2 out of 5

Size: Size:   small (small)

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Geocache Description:

Genealogy is my other hobby and it has taken me to almost as many cemeteries as geocaching. A combination of the two seems like a natural fit. This cache will be part of an CONNECTED series of caches in cemeteries where I have a family connection. The cache contains an unactivated geocoin for the FTF. As always with cemetery caches, please be respectful, no night time caching allowed, and no searching for the cache if there is a service in progress.


The Family Tree series:
Family Tree #1: Mount Calvary Catholic Cemetery
Family Tree #2: Holton Cemetery
Family Tree #3: North Cedar Cemetery
Family Tree #4: Denison Cemetery
Family Tree #5: Muscotah Cemetery
Family Tree #6: St. Ann's Cemetery
Family Tree #7: Pioneer Cemetery
Family Tree #8: Jenkins' (AKA: Vienna) Cemetery
Family Tree #9: Saint John's Cemetery
Family Tree #10: St. Joseph's Catholic Cemetery
Family Tree #11: Rochester Cemetery

This series of eleven caches is now spread over six counties in northeast Kansas. There are currently ten multis and one reverse wherigo in the series. All of the caches contain a clue that will help you find and open the final cache in the series. The clue has been written in multiple places on the log and/or on the container.


Muscotah Cemetery is located in the northeast corner of this tiny town. I have numerous cousins of varying levels of generations removed buried here. My connection to most of them can be traced from my gggg-grandparents. The posted coordinates will take you to their burial location.

STAGE ONE

Johannes was born in the Saxe Weimar duchy of Germany. His wife, Christina Schaeffer was born in the same area of Germany. They were married about 1838 and had three children in Germany before they immigrated to America in 1850. They arrived in New Orleans and along with several other German immigrants, they traveled up the Mississippi river and overland to Fort Des Moines, Iowa. They spent about seven years in this area, buried their only son, and had another daughter, before the "Bleeding Kansas" territory was opened to settlers in 1857. Johannes and his brother, Mathias, bought land at the Ozawkie land sale that year. The family loaded everything they had in a wagon, hitched up a team of oxen and moved to the farm, here in Atchison county. They spent the next four decades building that farm out of the prairie and raising what eventually grew to be a family of seven daughters. Each of those seven daughters married and had numerous children. When Christina passed away, they had 37 grandchildren and 26 great-grandchildren. They have several hundred descendants today. It is amazing to think about the experiences they had in their lives. They left everything they knew, traveled across an ocean and up a wild river with small children. They homesteaded on the prairie, twice. The second time in a state that was still wild and unsettled during a time of great violence.

Johannes and Christina with their seven daughters, the lady seated to the right of Christina is my ggg-grandmother, Julia. You will visit her at stage two.

You will need the information you find on the old tombstone that marks the final resting place of Johannes and Christina to find the coordinates for Stage Two, which is located at
N 39 33.ABC W 095 30.DEF
A: number designation of the month the Christina died
B: 2nd digit of the day Christina was born
C: day that Johannes was born
D: 4th digit of the year Johannes was born
E: 4th digit of the year Christina died
F: 4th digit of the year Johannes died
Checksum for the north coordinates is 29
Checksum for the west coordinates is 40


STAGE TWO
This stage is the burial location of my ggg-grandparents. Julia was the oldest child of Johannes and Christina. She married a man named Jacob in 1858. Jacob was born in Prussia and immigrated to America with his family around the same time as Julia and her family. His family settled in the area of Pittsburg, where Jacob lived for about three years until he heard the same call of cheap, open land in the west. He homesteaded near Julia's family in Atchison county. They lived on the farm for 42 years before moving into town three years before he passed away.

Jacob & Julia (Gliem) Eckert

Jacob & Julia Eckert with their five children. Their son, Jacob William Eckert, is standing on the right and he was my gg-grandfather.

Gather the following information from their tombstone and you will have the coordinates of the cache.
N 39 33.GHI W 095 30.JKL
G: 1st digit of Jacob's day of death
H: 1st digit of Julia's day of birth
I: 1st digit of Jacob's day of birth
J: month of Julia's birth minus five
K: month of Julia's death plus four
L: 3rd digit of the year Julia was born
Checksum for the north coordinates is 22
Checksum for the west coordinates is 35



Additional Hints (Decrypt)

Vg'f n gvtug fdhrrmr, ohg vg jvyy pbzr bhg.

Decryption Key

A|B|C|D|E|F|G|H|I|J|K|L|M
-------------------------
N|O|P|Q|R|S|T|U|V|W|X|Y|Z

(letter above equals below, and vice versa)