Unidentified grave sites at Kent’s Saar Pioneer Cemetery to get symbolic marker

Published 11:50 am Monday, August 5, 2013

Collaborative artists Frances Nelson and Bradly Gunn will give unidentified grave sites at Saar Pioneer Cemetery in Kent an emblematic marker using a series of ‘thresholds,’ or doorways.

The wooden armatures each will identify resting places of Kent’s founding pioneers at the cemetery, 21100 91st Pl. S, across from the WinCo Foods parking lot.

Crews will install the markers between Aug. 4 and Sept. 29, with an on-site reception from noon to 3 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 8.

There are 89 unmarked graves in Saar Cemetery, each unable to inform visitors of the individual buried there and the role they played in Kent history.

The Saar Pioneer Cemetery is the final resting place for many Kent-area pioneers. Of the approximately 200 people buried here, including five Civil War veterans, there are 89 graves with no existing headstones. Burial remains from 1873 through 1949 include many infants, some suicides, a murder victim, as well as deaths from childbirth, drowning, disease and old age.