Watch Tower History: May 2024

From The [Pittsburgh] Index, August 22, 1908.

WILLIAMS- Mrs . Birda Evaline Williams, aged 44 years, wife of Edward A. Williams and president of the Pittsburgh Sunshine Children's Home, died on Wednesday at the Homeopathic Hospital, following operation. Mrs. Williams was born at Bruceton, W. Va ., and was a daughter of Delmont and Martha Jones. She came to Pittsburgh with her parents when a child.

December 27, 1880, she was married to Mr. Williams and since has resided in North Lang Avenue. She leaves her husband, one son, Sidney F.; a daughter, Mrs. W. E. Jones; one grandchild, two brothers, Delmont Jones, of Pittsburgh, and Albert Jones, of Cincinnati, and a sister, Mrs. Fielding Frasher, Washington, Pa.

The circumstances surrounding the death of Charles Taze Russell have attracted much comment over the years. This writer can remember one source that mixed weird conspiracy theories with the claim that his body was taken to a “quack embalmer.” Another account sometimes circulated is that CTR’s body was embalmed three times. The recent discovery of a document from an undertaker in Waynoka, Oklahoma, has prompted this article. We are grateful to a friend of this blog for making it available and it will be featured later in this piece. We will use the various accounts in the Watch Tower magazine and newspapers like the St Paul Enterprise to explain what actually happened at that time and why. The story is obviously a sad one for those holding CTR in high esteem, but ultimately is quite straightforward.

CTR had been seriously ill when undertaking a series of visits to congregations in the far West and South West of America in the second half of October 1916. As his health deteriorated, he, along with traveling companion Menta Sturgeon, tried to get home to New York by train. He died on that return journey near Pampa, Texas, around 2 o’clock in the afternoon of Tuesday, October 31.

As CTR’s traveling companion, Menta Sturgeon tried to deal with the immediate aftermath of the death but found he could not travel on the railroads out of State without the body being embalmed. He wanted to reach Kansas City, but had no alternative but to stop at Waynoka for a death certificate and a brief inquest. And here, as the below advertisement shows, Kepner was the only choice in town.

From the Woods County Enterprise, April 2, 1915.

Kepner was the only one in Waynoka who was licensed to perform the task. We note from his advertisement that he was involved in several other ventures under the one roof. In the Enterprise for November 14, 1916, a Mrs Norah Voyles Keith wrote that “there in the back of a furniture store was all that remained of our beloved Pastor.” This was very common. Undertakers only had full-time work in the larger cities. Otherwise, many involved in furniture production simply branched out into making coffins. The only extra skill an undertaker needed to learn was embalming. Kepner perhaps had a head start because back in the 1880s he had also been involved in pharmaceuticals. From the Nemaha County Republican for October 9, 1884:

Josiah Bushy Kepner (1852-1944) was the same age as Pastor Russell. He had been in the undertaking business for nearly thirty years by the time he attended CTR, first in Sabetha, Kansas, and then in Waynoka, Oklahoma. He had been mayor twice in Sabetha, and was well respected in Waynoka, where he was to serve as president of a local bank.

His work was well spoken of in the St Paul Enterprise. From the Enterprise for November 21, 1916:

Kepner finally retired in 1929, but his second wife kept on the business at least until the 1940s. The advertisement below is from 1943.

It was eventually taken over by the Marshall Funeral Home (now in nearby Alva, Oklahoma) and it is from their inherited records that the copy of his bill to Menta Sturgeon was retrieved.

There are three charges. $5.00 for washing and dressing the body – the washing with disinfectant was normally done twice, both before and after the embalming process. Then there was $20 for the actual embalming, although Kepner doesn’t specify on the bill what fluid was used, and then $35 for the coffin for transportation on the railways.

The process for embalming that Kepner would have used really came into its own during the American Civil War. Those who could afford it wanted their loved ones who died on the battlefield to be returned to them for a family funeral with – if possible – an open coffin or casket. The procedure was not just to preserve the body but to make it appear as loved ones would want to remember. There was a goulish trade of embalmers following armies around offering soldiers about to go into combat a pre-paid plan. At one point these outfits were banned because of the bad effect on morale. Then, as noted above, the railways objected to unembalmed bodies being transported for health reasons, so it became common practice. Finally there were laws in each State stipulating that the procedure was necessary if the body had to be transported over a certain distance or out of State. The custom really took off after Abraham Lincoln was embalmed. His body went on tour and over a million people saw him lying in State over a 20 day period before his funeral. If it was good enough for Abraham Lincoln then it was good enough for the general population - if they could afford it.

The actual procedure involved using the circulatory system, discovered by William Harvey, to replace blood with a preservative solution. Originally this was arsenic based, but that wan’t too good for the living. By Kepner’s day it was generally formaldehyde, and this is still the case today. The procedure took between 2 and 4 hours. CTR’s body was taken off the train around 7 pm on the Tuesday evening, and returned to the train at 3 am the following Wednesday morning.

So this is the background as to why Menta Sturgeon could not just take CTR’s body back to New York. After the death, Sturgeon was forced to stop at the first place the embalming service could be provided.

What about the thought that CTR may have been embalmed more than once, up to three times?

When you think of bodies being embalmed multiple times you think of highly complicated procedures for figures like Lenin, but not for your average citizen.

But from Waynoka, CTR’s coffin was loaded on and off trains and motor vehicles and in and out of various buildings – the Bethel home, the New York City Temple, Carnegie Hall in Pittsburgh, etc. – and his remains were also transferred to a more substantial casket In New York for the funeral services. It was no doubt necessary to make what the November 21, 1916 St Paul Enterprise simply called “such little touches as the long trip would call for.” These would simply be cosmetic, so that each time CTR lay in State, the mourners could see him as they remembered him, as best as was possible in the circumstances.

Nearly a week after he passed away, mourners saw him for the last time, on Monday, November 6, at Carnegie Hall in Pittsburgh. There exists a photograph taken of the platform and the Carnegie Hall audience on the day reproduced below.

You will notice a blur across the photograph in front of the platform. This was actually a queue of mourners filing past the open casket, which the long exposure can only show as a smudge across the picture.

After this final service in Pittsburgh the body was taken for burial at dusk on the 6^th at the Society’s own plot in United Cemeteries. The casket would be interred inside its packing case and the whole encased in concrete.

ADDENDA

In the interests of being as complete and accurate as possible, I have now been made aware of where the account of three embalments comes from. It is from William Wisdom’s book Memoirs of Pastor Russell published in 1923. The book was reviewed – critically – in The Watch Tower for September 15, 1923. Wisdom states: “Through some more bungling the body was removed from the train at the first small town, where it was very improperly cared for in the way of embalming.”

There are no references given, and this account is in conflict with the contemporary accounts which praised Kepner’s work, but stated that – because of the length of the journey, some small adjustments were made (quote) “such little touches as the long trip would call for.” Kepner’s task was to preserve the body to meet the requirements of the law – extra touches might be applied to allow for extended viewing at several locations, but these would be cosmetic. An undertaker might use cosmetics and fillers to render a more lifelike appearance, but this was not a second or third embalming.

Kepner had been in practice for nearly thirty years and was well respected. His business survived him. And the basic procedure was straightforward and successful. As the above article covers, Abraham Lincoln was embalmed over 50 years before and lay in State at various locations for 20 days before the funeral. His coffin was opened several times after his death, the last time being in 1901 and the body was immediately recognisable – the hair, the wart on his right cheek, all still in place.

I stick to my original analysis.