The Amazing Rock of Frank Kuhn

Sometimes when you are strolling through a cemetery looking for interesting "tree shaped tombstones" your eye is grabbed by something very, very odd.

Like this:

What the heck?  This monument in a cemetery near Sheboygan Falls appears to have a large, colorful boulder on it.  Hmmmm...

The front view, much weathered and stained, just tells us that it is in memory of John F. Kuhn, who died November 23rd, 1884 in his fifty sixth year.  Lets go around to the side and look for more...

"The surmounting specimen was selected by Mr. Kuhn, and is placed here in compliance with his request."

By this point I had concocted a theory.  I imagined Mr. Kuhn to be a keen amateur geologist, possibly one who had traveled the world in search of interesting specimens.  But....why Mr. and not Doctor?  Graduate degrees were handed out pretty willy nilly back then.  And isn't that a rather awkward souvenier to haul back from, well, from anywhere really?

So here is the truth of it.

This is said to be a meteorite that fell on the nearby Kuhn family farm.  Mr. Kuhn hauled it to the cemetery with teams of horses and had it placed on the family plot.  It still gets occasional visitors who are interested in meteors.

Despite consulting a variety of local sources that is basically all I can find out about Mr. John F. Kuhn.  He had a meteor fall on his farm and thought that was so darned cool he wanted it as a grave marker!

Yep, looks meteoric to me.  The rusty iron star by the way is a G.A.R. marker.  It is broken off and probably came from a different grave as I find no listing of John Kuhn in any of the local Civil War units.