Conrad Rippy - Mt. Olivet Cemetery - Fort Worth, TX
N 32° 47.612 W 097° 18.913
14S E 657761 N 3629654
A Woodmen of the World monument serves as a cenotaph for Conrad Rippy, noting that he died en route to France in 1918 and was buried at sea. It stands in the Stephen Austin section of historic Mt. Olivet Cemetery in Fort Worth, TX.
Waymark Code: WM12CWD
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 04/30/2020
Views: 1
The Woodmen of the World are known today as WoodmenLife, a fraternal society that provides insurance to its members. Visitors to older cemeteries can frequently spot the marble tree trunk monuments that they placed at the graves of their members, although not every tree trunk monument out there was placed by the Woodmen of the World: It was common in the late 19th century to use a log to note that a person had died young. Eventually, those tree trunk monuments became too expensive to produce, and headstones would be marked with a Woodmen of the World emblem of some kind.
This isn't a unique example of a Woodmen of the World monument being used as a cenotaph, but it is rare. It is otherwise standard issue, with the Woodmen of the World emblem up high, and an inscription plate below it. It reads:
Conrad
Rippy
Feb. 6, 1896
May 24, 1918
Buried at
sea on way
to France.
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The American Battle Monuments Commission indicates that he was a Private in the U.S. Army, his unit the 110th Ammunition Trains in the 35th Division. He is listed on the Tablets of the Missing at Suresnes American Cemetery in Suresnes, France.
The Tarrant County Genealogy Trails website (see below) lists him on a page dedicated to county heroes of World War I. He was born in Everman and raised on a farm, growing up to become a pretty good mechanic. He answered the call when Uncle Sam came looking for him during the Great War. In March 1918, he was sent to Fort Sill as an instructor but was in turn assigned to the Ammunition Train as a Master Mechanic. He was sent to New York on May 1, 1918, which departed for France soon after. On board, Rippy was stricken with pneumonia and spinal meningitis, living just twenty-four hours after falling ill. He was buried at sea, seven hundred miles from Halifax, NS.
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