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Day Tripper | A tombstone tourist visits greater Gig Harbor cemeteries

Posted on September 30th, 2026 By: Mary Williams

It might surprise you to learn that Day Tripper stories aren’t just random. In fact, quite a bit of planning goes into each one.

This month’s story was inspired by a mid-summer trip to Home Goods. Walking through the doors, it seemed crystal clear that Halloween and The Day of the Dead (Dia de los Muertos) must be just around the corner, which didn’t feel quite right. Why in the world, I wondered, were stores already full of Halloween stuff when lawn chairs and BBQ equipment seemed more appropriate?

A quick trip to the computer answered that question. An analysis by Reuter reports that Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas inject a combined $1.7 trillion annually into the U.S. economy. Last year, U.S. consumer spending during the late October holiday reached an all-time high of $13.1 billion.

The holidays are big business. Photo by Mary Williams

Dia de los Muertos

Recently, one of the fastest-growing trends has been sales of decorations and party goods celebrating Día de los Muertos, Nov. 1 and 2. Once primarily a religious holiday, its popularity grew following the 2017 Disney-Pixar blockbuster “Coco,” which introduced the imagery, music and philosophy of the holiday to millions.

What is the Day of the Dead, you may ask? Traditionalists believe this is the day when the gates of heaven are open to those who are transitioning from purgatory into heaven. Some theorize that paranormal activities are prevalent right then. If ever there were to be apparitions in our midst, it would be over the three-day period from Halloween through Nov. 2.

Where might I go to investigate these potential hauntings? A family member mentioned that Gig Harbor-area cemeteries host tours occasionally.

After a bit of research, I can clearly deny that I’m a taphologist, someone who scientifically or historically studies cemeteries and epitaphs. I don’t think I could even be described as a taphophile, a person who loves or is fascinated by cemeteries.

I’m more of a “tombstone tourist,” someone who travels to visit famous or historic graves.

Cemeteries near and far

I have been lucky enough to visit some well-known cemeteries in Savannah, Georgia, and New Orleans, as well as Forrest Lawn in Los Angeles. I haven’t visited many graveyards in Washington state, though I found Buena Vista in Port Gamble pretty fascinating when I stopped by while researching the October 2023 Day Tripper.

Buena Vista Cemetery in Port Gamble. Photo by Mary Williams

I think it’s one of only two graveyards previously I visited for a Day Tripper excursion. The other was at Fort Lawton in Discovery Park in Seattle.

The military cemetery at Discovery Park in Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood. Photo by Mary Williams

It certainly seemed like the right time to investigate some of the historical graveyards in our community.

I’m not sure what it is about a collection of graves and tombstones that make them fascinating to so many people. It’s different, of course, if the gravesite is the permanent resting place of a member of your own family.

Olalla Valley Pioneer Cemetery

Since this is a Halloween/Day of the Dead story, I decided I should start my research by checking if any local burial sites are thought to be haunted.

The only one I could find that seems to have that reputation is the Olalla Valley Pioneer Cemetery, also known as the Old Olalla Cemetery or Starvation Heights Cemetery. It is an abandoned historic graveyard located off Olalla Valley Road in Kitsap County.

Established sometime around 1901, it covers roughly 1.5 acres of wooded hillside that’s no longer easily accessible. It appears that it was abandoned around 1930, with no formal burials recorded after that.

The cemetery is infamously tied to the nearby historic site of Starvation Heights, the early 1900s sanitarium operated by Dr. Linda Hazzard, where multiple patients died from forced fasting. That whole era is memorialized in Gregg Olsen’s book, Starvation Heights, and at Olsen’s Olalla Bay Museum at 13965 Crescent Valley Road SE.

The museum at Gregg Olsen’s Olalla Bay Market.

Several people I spoke with had unsuccessfully tried to find that cemetery. I was pretty sure I wouldn’t have any better luck, so I decided to check out another Pierce County cemetery on the west edge of our area before focusing on Key Peninsula and Gig Harbor burial sites.

Victor Cemetery

The Victor Cemetery, also known as the Pedersen Family Cemetery, is located just inside Pierce County, about a mile off Elgin Clifton Road where 144th Street and Victor Road meet.

The entrance to the Victor Cemetery. Photo by Mary Williams

The P. G. Pederson family donated the two-acre site for use as a cemetery in 1910 or 1911. It is partially fenced, has some greenery, and receives occasional maintenance from local volunteers.

Fifty-three souls are said to be buried there, although not all have grave markers. The map shown below is typical of those posted at many of the smaller facilities making it possible, with a little imagination and investigation, to actually locate a particular grave or headstone.

It can be difficult to locate a specific gravesite in the Victor Cemetery. Photo by Mary Williams

The small cemeteries I visited are pretty well-maintained, but strictly by volunteers. Those that are affiliated with churches or other groups seem better able to generate the financial support and volunteer time necessary to keep the facilities neat and the grounds cared for.

Haven of Rest

My next visit was a place we are all familiar with, the area’s most prominent mortuary and cemetery site, Haven of Rest on Highway 16. It is one thing the others are not: A comprehensive funeral home providing an array of services including funerals, cremations, and burials.

The Haven of Rest property spans 29.5 acres and most reports estimate there are about 9,000 people buried there, with residency growing pretty much on a daily basis. So far only 16 acres have been developed.

The facility is beautifully maintained and impeccably landscaped. But this is not a story about end-of-life alternatives, so I decided to stay in my lane and return to my travels looking for smaller non-commercial burial grounds.

I was surprised to learn that more than a dozen other cemeteries dot the local landscape, about half of them in Gig Harbor and the other half on the Key Peninsula. Many started as a resting place for a prominent family or two and then expanded to serve the nearby community.

Cromwell Cemetery

The Cromwell Cemetery website is a comprehensive and invaluable link to local area gravesites. It lists nine cemeteries on the Key Peninsula and features a link to each of them, although two are the aforementioned Victor Cemetery and Haven of Rest.

I was also surprised to learn that I drive by one of them several times a day nearly every day. The Minter Cemetery is located on the corner of 118th Street and Creviston Drive NW. Just as I never knew it, you would never know there were graves there.

The area is heavily overgrown and no longer accessible. Records indicate that it was donated by the Moss family and is alternatively known as the Moss Family Cemetery, the Minter Pioneer Cemetery, or the Elgin Cemetery.

The Cromwell website mentions Minter Cemetery and “nearby” Home Cemetery. That’s true only if you consider nearby to be 9.1 miles. Only nine burials are recorded in the Home Cemetery.

Home Cemetery

Records show that Joseph Hieman conveyed the cemetery property to the Home Grange No. 701 in November 1920. In May 1922, the Grange sold the land to the Peninsula Social Club for $1 for the purpose of it being used for a cemetery. No active association formed to care for it, so it long since fell into disrepair. Brush obscures the road leading to it.

In the late 1800s, the Lutheran Church on the KP and the Old German Lutheran Cemetery were on the same property. The church was built first on eight donated acres at the intersection that is now 158th Avenue and 24th Street. The streets and their names apparently came later than the church and graves. When the church was completed, left-over land was set aside for the cemetery.

A sign on the gate of the Old German Lutheran Cemetery. Photo by Mary Williams

The church declined in popularity over time and the old cemetery was all but abandoned after construction of the new Key Peninsula Lutheran Church. The old church burned down in an arson fire in 1971. The congregation sold timber and fund-raised to pay back taxes and regain ownership of the property. The church may be gone, but the cemetery lives on.

Church leadership has decided that no further burials will take place in the historic portion of the cemetery to honor the early pioneers. Plenty of plots in the new section are still available for purchase by Key Peninsula residents.

Gravesites in the Old German Lutheran cemetery. Photo by Mary Williams

The cemetery is well-maintained with no overgrowth or visible weeds. Several shaded areas are lush and green, but much of the newer area is parched and in urgent need of watering, divine or otherwise.

Vaughn Bay Community Cemetery

Vaughn Bay Community Cemetery is the big kid of the group. Compared to all the little graveyards, it’s so big it has two names. In addition to the Vaughn Bay moniker, it is also been known as Bay View Cemetery, obviously based on the stunning view of the bay from every corner of the facility.

The Vaughn Bay Cemetery. Photo by Mary Williams

The Maxwell and Irwin families established the cemetery in 1890, and more than 1,000 burials took place there since. The cemetery received funding for a recent indexing project. Find a Grave, a comprehensive national website, has documented over 818 individual memorials there.

The cemetery is the final resting place for more than 250 veterans. A Key Peninsula veteran’s group sponsors the local “Aisle of Honor” Memorial Day event which is among the largest ceremonies of its kind west of the Mississippi.

The earliest burial record is from 1895. The Bayview Cemetery Association formed in September 1915 and purchased the land for the cemetery. In May 1958, the ogranization became the Vaughn Bay Cemetery Association. There is little wonder that both names stuck. The view of the bay from every corner of the cemetery is fantastic.

That’s a pretty nice view for a final resting place. Photo by Mary Williams

Elsewhere on the KP

The Neiman Family Cemetery is a private family burial ground on the east side of 186th Ave NW, across the street from Vaughn Bay Cemetery.

Two other active cemeteries complete our Key Peninsula tombstone tour. Lakebay Cemetery is at 222 Cornwall Road SW, adjacent to Lakebay Community Church. The site borders Key Peninsula Highway but is accessed by turning left to Cornwall Road and entering the church parking lot.

A sign for the Lakebay Cemetery. Photo by Mary Williams

Several local pioneer families are represented in this facility. At least 10 members of the Creviston family are buried there. Available records indicate that the first member of the family to be laid to rest there was Ira Creviston around 1880.

A Creviston family plot at the Lakebay Cemetery. Photo by Mary Williams

The furthest south of the KP graveyards is the Longbranch Cemetery.

Founded in 1905, the Longbranch Cemetery sits on a hillside adjacent to Key Peninsula Hwy S. in Longbranch. The nonprofit Longbranch Cemetery Association manages it. Only KP residents can be buried here.

Graves at the Longbranch Cemetery. Photo by Mary Williams

Back to Gig Harbor

It was time to move on to Gig Harbor. My preliminary research suggested that I needed to visit the Old Gig Harbor, Artondale, Cromwell and Fox Island cemeteries.

The smallest of these was as big as all but the largest of the Key Peninsula cemeteries. They each have their own website with comprehensive databases of their burials.

The 116-year-old Fox Island Cemetery on Sixth Avenue. Photo by Mary Williams

The Fox Island Cemetery is noteable as the final resting place of former Gov. Dixie Lee Ray and her sister. Located at 797 Sixth Avenue on Fox Island, it is almost exactly 2 miles south of the Fox Island bridge.

A Mr. Hunter donated the land for it in 1911. Of its more than 500 graves, about 25% are for veterans. Many of the earliest non-native pioneers are also buried there. The site includes a vault that can store cremated remains.

The Cromwell Cemetery is worth checking out if for no other reason than that it also has had different names. Formally called Hales Passage Scandinavian Lutheran Cemetery, it is also known locally as Cromwell Cemetery.

Most people just call it Cromwell Cemetery. Photo by Mary Williams

Gabriel Evje and F.W. Samuelson each donated one acre of land to form the cemetery. A Cemetery Association was formed on Jan. 3, 1903. The grounds are beautifully maintained.

Artondale Cemetery

Artondale Cemetery is the final resting place of many of the founders of the city of Gig Harbor. The cemetery was established in 1895 on 2.75 acres of land donated by Miles Barzilla Hunt and his wife, Maritta. It is located at 5512 Hunt St.

If you walk through the graves, you’ll recognize many familiar names. The association website also lists burials by the year they happened. Only a few burials per year have occurred recently.

During the pandemic, I lost track of many friends and acquaintances. As I was researching this story, I came across the name of one of them. She was one of three people buried at Artondale in 2025. While we were sad to know she passed, I am glad the mystery was solved.

The Artondale Cemetery, where many early non-native settlers are buried. Photo by Mary Williams

Rosedale Cemetery

Rosedale Cemetery is easy to find from Artondale. Continue down Hunt, through the curve onto Lombard Street, which ends at Rosedale. Turn left and the cemetery is one mile away on your right.

Founded in 1895 (the sign says 1896, but Greg Spadoni explained last year why that’s wrong), the Rosedale Cemetery is now home to nearly 500 graves. Its website includes a request for $15 annual dues, something I did not find anywhere else. It also notes that as a nonprofit, payment is voluntary. It seems to me a very sensible thing to request given the need for funding to cover maintenance.

The Rosedale Cemetery. Photo by Mary Williams

Finally, I made my way to one of the hardest to find and oldest Gig Harbor cemeteries.

At 10317 Gig Harbor St. is an area that is not easily accessible called the Gig Harbor Cemetery or the Old Pioneer Gig Harbor Cemetery.

Among those buried at the Gig Harbor Cemetery are Dr. Alfred Burnham and Lucy Goodman. Ten veterans of the Civil War rest there, as do veterans of the Spanish American War, Civil War, World War I, WWII, Korea and Vietnam.

Time to reflect

With my greater Gig Harbor Cemetery Tour complete, I needed some time to reflect. What really struck me is amount of time, energy, and love that goes into maintaining this patchwork quilt that pieces together the history of our community.

A quick and far from comprehensive dive into AI sent me to several sites that had fairly consistent information. Fifty years ago, 66% of people were buried and 33% cremated. That number has now reversed and is growing every day. There are all sorts of implications inherent in this that will need to be addressed sooner rather than later. So while this physical Day Trip may be over, I think it will live on in my mind for quite some time.

If you know a teenager who would like to learn more about Dia de los Muertos, the Gig Harbor branch of the Pierce County Library is sponsoring an activity from 4 to 5:30 Tuesday, Oct. 13. Artist and educator Vaquero Azul will guide the creation of an ofrenda, a temporary altar set up to honor and welcome deceased loved ones during the Day of the Dead celebration. Participants will learn about the significance of Día de los Muertos, what each day of the celebration focuses on, and how remembrance and honoring loved ones are central to the tradition.

About the Day Tripper column

Gas prices are sky high, and a night in a hotel is approaching astronomically expensive. So, for the foreseeable future, I imagine many of you are going to find yourselves taking day trips rather than the road trip vacations we’ve grown to love.

This beautiful region in which we live is ripe with opportunities to explore new places, see new things, and learn a little something at the same time. I promise to keep the longest journeys to a one-way distance of under 200 miles. Whether you want to make it an overnight trip, a weekend, or just a very long day trip, we should be able to pull it off.

I hope you’ll grant me the honor of your virtual company as we travel these roads together. Happy trails!