Back when I lived near a local cemetery, I would just meander through the headstones, sometimes snapping photos of ones that catch my eye. This one, it caught my eye. Can you see why?? If you look at it, it says she is buried with her son, but no dates for him. Having a fascination for not only cemeteries, but geneology, I decided to look into this.
Catherine was born on May 5th 1913 in Pennsylvania. She had a husband named Michael, who was born on August 21st/23rd 1904/5 in Ohio. On September 21st 1932, they welcomed their first child, a little girl named Deloris. On January 24th, 1934, they welcomed their second daughter, Rose. Catherine was born on May 19, 1935. Their daughter Irene was born in in 1936.
Sometime in the fall, Catherine would of gotten pregnant with her son, Michael JR. I'm sure she was anticipating a normal delivery with him and was likely looking forward to the possibility of this being their first son. Unfortunately, this was not going to have the happy ending that was anticipated.
On May 27th 1941, due to an obstructed labor, a craniotomy was performed on Michael, who was hydrocephalic. I do NOT recommend googling this operation as it's fairly barbaric. Michael either had a birth defect or an infection or was already gone. Either way, they had to do this in order to remove the baby as it was "less risky" to the mother to do this. They had to do an x-ray to get a visual and then put Catherine through this.
Sadly, Catherine developed puerperal infection due to the procedure she underwent. Just ten days later at 2:08pm on June 6th, 1941, Catherine passed away due to the infection, leaving behind her husband and four daughters.
