BERKELEY, Mo. -- A gravestone bearing the picture of an angel marks the grave of an unidentified girl, thanks to a letter-writing campaign by an Illinois high school class.
The gravestone was placed through the efforts of students at Community High School in Livingston, Ill. A letter-writing campaign by the students resolved a bureaucratic mix-up over the marker.
The decapitated girl was between 8 and 9 years old, police said. Her body was found in February 1983. She had been raped, and her hands were tied behind her back. Her head was never found, and St. Louis homicide Detective Herb Riley said police still have no clues to her identity.
In a brief ceremony Thursday, 15 members of the high school class were present for a headstone-laying ceremony at the Washington Park Cemetery in the St. Louis suburb Berkeley.
'We know that this young girl went through a living hell, but will remain in heaven forever,' said Livingston student Michael Darnell, 17, as he read a prayer he had written.
The class three months ago read abut the Schaefer Monument Co.'s wish to donate a monument for the girl's grave and the refusal by cemetery officials, because of a bureaucratic mix-up, to allow Charles and Mary Schaefer to erect the stone.
Mike Baumer, the students' teacher, wrote letters to the St. Louis medical examiner's office and cemetery officals and in February it was agreed the stone could be moved to the grave.
The stone carries a picture of an angel and reads: 'The saddened hearts were healed in knowing that the pain of life is over and the beauty of the soul revealed.'
After erecting the monument, Schaefer told the high school students, 'Without your help, this stone would not be at this site. I guess everything else has been said that can be.'
The class decorated the grave with a large spray of red, pink and white carnations, and then boarded their school bus and left.
'It's good to know that in the same world where a crime like this can occur, there are also wonderful people,' said Ginni Younger, the cemetery's assistant manager.
