The Historic City Cemetery

 old resident colonist of colony of Connecticut  McDole married great granddaughter ida Phillips not living together

 In the early 1900's, a Tonawanda woman, Mrs. Rudolph Ismer, became central to a series of events that revealed how uncertain death could be.  In 1907, believing she recognized the description of a suicide victim found on a train in Nebraska, Mrs. Ismer identified the body as that of her son, Arthur Perry. The remains were brought back and buried in the family plot in Tonawanda. But the identification was wrong. Perry later returned alive, revealing that another man had been buried under his name. By that time, his wife, believing him dead had already remarried. That experience shaped everything that followed.  In 1910, when a body was recovered from the Niagara River and thought to possibly be her husband, Mrs. Ismer was asked to identify it. This time, she hesitated. Newspapers reported that she examined the body carefully but refused to make a definite identification, fearing she might repeat her earlier mistake. The body was buried as unknown. Soon after, another twis...