"Death ends a life, not a relationship," American humorist Robert Benchley once said. I suppose he's right, because relationships die long before people do, at least in the case hundreds of unclaimed bodies cremated each year in Los Angeles.
There are some however, that are trying to breathe life into the relationships that perhaps decayed emotionally for years.
In just two years, unclaimedpersons.org has grown to a purely volunteer organization of 400 members working with coroners across the country, including the L.A. County Coroner to solve unclaimed body cases. Their tagline reads "every life is worth remembering."
To date, they've solved close to 150 cases and hope to solve many more.
Their involvement with coroners from California to Hawaii and Florida make it evident that the 'unclaimed body phenomenon' isn't just an L.A. thing. In counties all over the U.S. bodies are going unclaimed, mostly due to the strains the economy is putting on families who can't afford the costs involved in funerals or cremations.
Their only option is to wait - either they have funds or they don't. If they don't that means they get to be cremated, stored for two years and then buried in one common grave at the 'potters field' in the L.A. County Cemetery, in the heart of Los Angeles right by Evergreen Cemetery, the oldest in the city. The closest they come to any emotional connection to those still living is a private, non-denominational ceremony that is held at the end of every year.
I'll be heading down to potters field soon, so at least all those who truly got lost in the city of Angles will get one visitor.
With all the figures and procedures pretty much covered, there is something that has proved slightly challenging in this entire process, that is, trying to put faces behind the facts. On the one hand, there are privacy issues involved in obtaining intimate details and information about a person's life, on the other hand, it's a kind of morbid thing to ask people, especially next of kin to discuss. So here I am, in the middle of a rock and a hard place. The stories are out there, and I am actively doing what I can to pursue them in the short amount of time I have, but if you happen to be reading this and think you can help, please let me know.
Posted by Liana Aghajanian on 04/29/10
