The Final Salute: Laying the Unclaimed to Rest with Dignity Episode Transcript
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Welcome to the Remembering a Live Podcast. My guest today is Lanae Strovers, a licensed funeral director at Caldwell Parish Funeral Home and a trainer for the National Funeral Directors Association. Lanae was called to funeral service after the death of a close friend whose cookie cutter funeral failed to tell his story. In that moment, Lanae knew that there was a better way and she has dedicated her career to making that vision a reality. Earlier in her career, she launched The Final Salute, a program dedicated to laying unclaimed cremated remains to rest with dignity and honor. To date, the program has honored over 250 civilians, 60 children, and 100 veterans. Her work has gained national recognition with features on the front page of major publications, including USA Today, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Des Moines Register. Welcome, Lanae. It's great to have you on the podcast.
LANAE STROVERS:
Thanks for having me.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So I think this is something most of us really don't even think about, but every year the cremated remains of many individuals from all walks of life go unclaimed by family members and friends and sit on shelves and funeral homes across the country. Some remains have gone unclaimed for decades. Lanae, why does this happen and how common is this?
LANAE STROVERS:
I wish I could answer the question of why does this happen. Because every individual story is so different of why it happens. But the big picture a lot is family. Sometimes it's lack thereof family. Sometimes it's being estranged from family. Sometimes it's not having communication with family. So it all comes back to that. And that's the thing I get asked a lot is, does this happen a lot? And it does. We're based here in Iowa and I just say, if we're having this huge problem in Midwest Iowa, imagine what's happening in the bigger cities and on the coasts and it's becoming a national crisis that nobody wants to talk about.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So you saw a real need to meaningfully honor these individuals. Tell me about The Final Salute.
LANAE STROVERS:
So I want to say a little bit about how it started because I think that's really important. So as you mentioned in my intro, I'm a licensed funeral director and embalmer and about eight years ago I had to have a major, major hip surgery. I had to move a hospital bed into my house. I was going to be on bedrest for three months and I'm an extremely active person and I knew that I was going to go bonkers just sitting there and probably drive my husband up a wall. So I wanted to have a project. And so the funeral home I was at at that time, I reached out to him and I said, the owners, and I said, "Is there anything I can do from home? Stuffing envelopes, making phone calls, whatever." And they came to me and they said, "Lanae, we've got about 300 urns in our basement that are just hanging out.”
And I had no idea at that point and I'd been at that funeral home for quite a while. And so I was like, "Okay, sounds good." So I started making phone calls and it started a lot of, "Oh crud. I forgot." Or, "I am so sorry, my brother was supposed to pick mom up." Or I got a lot of, "I don't want them." We also found that some people just didn't have anybody, whether the person that signed all their paperwork at the beginning had also died or it was a guardian or somebody from the state that had just handled things. And so that's kind of where I'm calling all these people and realizing, "Gosh, we have some people that don't have anybody, but I don't feel right about leaving them in our basement." And so that's kind of where I had this 2 a.m. thought of, let's have a service for them.
And that was kind of the start of Final Salute.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So what did that first service look like? Who were the individuals you were memorializing and laying to rest?
LANAE STROVERS:
Sure. So in 2018, we had our first civilian service. These were individuals that did not serve in the military, just regular people like you and me and for whatever reason they were left behind. And so we had a very small service I think maybe like 20 people attended and we said each one of their names and we laid them to rest into a vault. Then also that same year we had a service for nine children. Again, very small service, laid them to rest. And then in 2018, we also did our first veteran service and we had three veterans that first year. And so we started off pretty small and pretty simple.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Did you have any idea at that time what you were creating?
LANAE STROVERS:
No. And it's still mind boggling to me that this is where we're at. They call it imposter syndrome and I definitely have that with this project and I say every year, "Okay guys, this could be our last year." And that's kind of my famous last words because it hasn't been yet.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So can you describe one of the services? What generally happens at these services?
LANAE STROVERS:
Sure. So I want to talk first about our most recent civilian service. So this was our second service and I really did not know what to expect. We had 150 individuals that urns have been left behind, which is an incredible amount of people if you really think about it. And so we put a call out to the public and say, "Hey, please join us." And I was so astounded when I pulled into the parking lot, we were going to meet and then go in procession and there was 30, 40, 50 cars in line already by the time I got there. It was really beautiful. We were escorted by our local law enforcement to a private cemetery and we had 80 people lined up to help carry these urns of people they never met. It was so beautiful and so humbling to see the public show up for these people.
We had a singer who sang Amazing Grace. We had a minister that said a few words and we just were really there as a community. Now our veteran services look a lot different. So our veteran services is we research each individual. So we tell their life story at the service. We will only do a maximum of 15 ... Well, I shouldn't say that. This year we're doing 16. I'll tell you why in a little bit, but we research their stories. We want to tell that we have a service at the church first, then we go on procession and then out at Iowa Veterans Cemetery we do military honors, which is I've seen it hundreds of times if not thousands and there's just something about hearing “TAPS” and watching a flag get folded.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So do you research all of the people? Do you try to research the civilians also to find out what their story is?
LANAE STROVERS:
Yes. We research each and every person. We just don't tell all of those individual stories at the service, otherwise we would be there for probably eight hours, but we do pull out a few of the stories and tell those at the service.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
That's wonderful that that storytelling really helps keep those people alive in the minds of other people, perhaps people who didn't even know them.
LANAE STROVERS:
And it was really interesting. I had so many people that reached out after the service and said, "Hey, this was the name on the urn I carried. Can you tell me more about them so that I can help honor and I can say their name and continue to think of them?" And that was so touching to me that people cared that much.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Yeah. Tell me a little bit about the urns. We have a video of your most recent civilian service. It is incredibly moving and I'm going to post it along with this episode, but can you tell us a little bit about what it looks like? What do the urns look like? Some of them look like boxes and then what do you put them in for the burial? How does that work?
LANAE STROVERS:
Yeah. So when these urns are turned into us, they are from cardboard boxes that are falling apart to beautiful marble urns to tin cans, they're kind of all over. And so we as an organization decided that we wanted to make them all uniform. This was for multiple reasons. One is so somebody's urn wasn't nicer than somebody else's urn, but we also for being able to fit them all in the vault, we wanted them to all be the same. And so I reached out to Starrmark and said, "Hey, we're a nonprofit. Is there any way you can give us a little bit of a price cut on these?" And they came back and said, "We would like to donate all 150 urns to you, " which was incredible and a little overwhelming that they were willing to step up and help us with that. And so all of the men that we buried had a wood grain urn and then all of the women that we buried had a mountain scene and then we placed each one of their names on the top of their urn.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Oh, that's lovely. And then they go into a vault, is that correct? And they're buried together?
LANAE STROVERS:
Yep. So we worked with Watts Vault and Monument here in Des Moines where they created this beautiful healing tree burial vault and we placed all of the urns in there. We put them alphabetical order. So if we'd ever have to go back in, we know kind of where everybody is. And then what was really, really unique at the end of the service is the top of the vault has a tree and we handed out black Sharpies and people wrote their names, wrote messages and really put their personal touch on it and watching the people sign that vault as they were leaving just really brought together like, "Okay, we're your family now."
GAIL MARQUARDT:
That's really lovely. Can you recall a specific story about one of the people whose remains you've late to rest? Any stories that really stick out to you?
LANAE STROVERS:
So I think one of the ones that this most recent in our unclaimed civilian one that really stuck out was a lady named Charity. When researching Charity, her name was coming up with all kinds of stuff, which was kind of unique for how long she had been deceased. And the reason it was was because her son was killed in World War I in France and she's a Gold Star mom, which here in Iowa we've just recently lost six of our own and Gold Star families are something we hold very, very near and dear to our hearts here. And so I reached out to two other Gold Star families and they were able to carry her earn and lay her to rest. So that was really a full circle moment to be able to do that. When I think of the veterans ones, one of my favorite stories is of Joseph Chester.
Joseph Chester had died in 1929 and so almost a hundred years ago and with researching him, I kind of had this moment of, are my eyes really working because Joseph served in the Civil War and so we were able to lay him to rest with his honors, get him a headstone that it would have been when he died the time period for that. But just the history of somebody that served in the Civil War still had not been buried was pretty incredible.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Wow, that really is incredible. So most of the remains, are these deaths that occurred relatively recently or does it really span many decades?
LANAE STROVERS:
Oh, they're from all over the place. We had one lady this year that died in 1919 and it makes you think, "Gosh, she died before women could vote." And then we have people that have died just more recently, but their guardians have asked us, "Hey, we love what you're doing. This person that's my client or person that I'm serving is a veteran. We would like to see him have his honors." And so it spans decades of who we're honoring.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
You mentioned that you did a service with children. How does that service, if at all, look different from the services that you hold for adults?
LANAE STROVERS:
So we really put a lot of thought into the service for children because that's a very delicate conversation to have and we wanted to make sure that we were doing it the right way. We did decide to invite the community and people really showed up for it. We just made it a little bit softer. We had individuals that carried these little urns. We actually had a church that made little urns for us. We kept it very, very simple and there's just a different feel. My biggest message, especially with the children, is that we do not judge why any of these children were left. There are some stories of pregnancies that sometimes the moms aren't happy and then they had a miscarriage and they didn't want to have those remains or maybe the miscarriage was so overwhelming that taking baby home with them or burying them was just too much.
And so that's where we were able to step in and to do that. And so again, a little different of a scenario, but a service that we needed to provide to the community.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Yeah. Everyone's circumstances are so different and we never know the full story about any one of these individuals. I read an article that you also got, was it a high school class involved in a project to make urns?
LANAE STROVERS:
Yes. So a few years ago, well, I broke my rule of how many we were going to bury and we buried 25 people and I was like, "Gosh, we do some fundraising but we don't have a ton of money. So where are we going to get all of these urns that's in our budget?" And I live in a small town in Monroe, Iowa, and our shop class always does a project for the veterans in our community. I thought, "I wonder what a bunch of high school kids would think about making urns." And so I went to the teacher and he's like, "I better ask the students." And he called me back, he goes, "100% they all want to do it. They're so excited about it and now they've done it for three years and are going to continue to do it." And so it's been a really cool way to show that high school group of kids, like this is being a part of something bigger.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
I love that story and I love it not only for the reasons you've mentioned, but also because it encourages them to talk about death and funerals and helps normalize those conversations. I love that. So I also understand you've had calls from funeral homes all over the country looking for assistance with this because they also have unclaimed remains. How is that playing out? How are you helping other funeral homes?
LANAE STROVERS:
So I'm a big believer in stealing my idea. Some people are like, "Do you want other people to copy?" "Yes, please do." We are hoping to branch out as The Final Salute. We are a nonprofit 5013C, so there's some legalities with that, but we are looking for states to start their own branches. I believe I've got somebody in Ohio that's about ready to do it. I believe I've got somebody in North Carolina. We're just still working out the details, but I tell people, even if you don't want to use the final salute's name, I don't care who does it just as long as someone does it. I will talk to any funeral director, give them my advice, give them what we do because it's a problem everywhere. And in the media right now, as we all know, sometimes funeral directors and funeral homes don't always have the best light and this is a great way to get involved in your community.
The media is usually very kind to us in these situations that we can show that we are here to help and we are doing the right thing.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
What an incredible legacy for you as a funeral director in addition to all the amazing work you do to serve other families, but to have established this and know how it's growing and know how it's needed and how it's appreciated, you should be really proud of this and I hope you are.
LANAE STROVERS:
I definitely am. I keep every year thinking, "Gosh, are we still doing this? Is it still the right thing to do? " And the community supports me so incredibly much and I have an incredible board that helps me and that's the only reason that it works, but I've been called to do this.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So I'm interested to know as a funeral director, what does it mean to you to do this specific work? You serve families every day who have family, who want to memorialize their loved ones, have the means to ... How is this work different and how does it feed your soul?
LANAE STROVERS:
So for me, it's very personal. I don't know that I've shared this story with you, but I'm adopted and for a long time I did not know who my biological family was. And so when I started this project and I'm sitting there, I'm thinking, "Gosh, any one of these people could be a relative of mine. It could be a dad, a mom, a grandma, a brother, a sister. And if I ever find out someday that one of these individuals that's sitting in our basement was a family member of mine, would I be okay with them still sitting down there?" And I wasn't. And so that's where I can to this day still treat each person as if they are my family. I take that very personally. I know almost every name of every single urn that we've buried. I personally research each one of them and can tell you the stories because they're my family.
They're my people now.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
That's lovely. And what you're doing through this is helping other people make connections to people they've never met and helping them honor people they've never met. So hopefully it's also making people think about, this could be someone I know. What if this was someone I know?
LANAE STROVERS:
And we are getting that. We have people that will reach out and say, "Oh my gosh, this was a classmate of mine or this was a distant family member of mine. I had no idea." So we were able to solve a family mystery with Joseph Chester, our Civil War veteran. We were able to find his great, great granddaughters after the burial. They were looking up his name and our stuff came up and they'd always wondered what happened to him. And so the story is getting bigger than just laying these individuals to rest.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
That's incredibly meaningful and it just shows how we're all connected.
LANAE STROVERS:
Absolutely.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
It's beautiful work that you're doing. So I ask all of my guests, who are you remembering today?
LANAE STROVERS:
So today I am remembering my Grandpa Gritters. My Grandpa Gritters was an incredible human. He was so kind and he treated everybody like they were his family and I've always just strived to be the person that he was.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
Well, he would be very proud of you.
LANAE STROVERS:
Thank you.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
So we'll post some links on the website if you'd like to learn more about the work Lanae does for the Final Salute. We'll also post that video of her most recent ceremony. It does just a beautiful job of illustrating the impact of her meaningful work. Thank you so much for joining me on this episode today, Lanae. This was really a lovely conversation.
LANAE STROVERS:
Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it.
GAIL MARQUARDT:
And to learn more about remembering loved ones in meaningful ways, visit RememberingALife.com.