Near our old farmhouse is a small pioneer cemetery, which used to be located in the creek valley just below us. It, like our old farmhouse, was part of a Finnish settlement that was established at the turn of the last century. Suise Creek was a community of loggers and coal miners and their families, who lived their lives near the banks of the creek.
The community is long gone, but some of the bones of the old settlement are still here, if you know where to look. Like the steps out near our county road, which once climbed to a white clapboard church. The old barns are slowly decaying and collapsing, to my great regret. But many of the original farmhouses still stand, and the names of the settlers live on the names of streets and schools.
The settlers established the cemetery too close to the creek, and the first time it flooded, they relocated it on top of the hill, out of harms way. The county changed the spelling of the creek to Soos Creek, but the cemetery still bears the original (and correct) name of the community.
Today we shared this peaceful place with a flock of chickens from the farmhouse next door.
I love old farmhouse settlements.
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