IN
Memory
of
ELDRIDGE PAULEY
Who was Born 10th
March 1824
Died July 20th 1837
The small gravestone of Eldridge Pauley in the Rose Hill Cemetery in Bloomington, Indiana, was carved with a misspelling—a crucial mistake. Every journalist is taught that you at the very least have to spell names correctly in newspaper articles, and as it should be for stone carvers.
So, in this instance, Eldridge Pauley’s name was carved without the “u” in his name. What is a carver to do—start over? It isn’t like there is correcting tape for a limestone gravestone, and it is time consuming and expensive to start over. So, in this case, the enterprising stone cutter chose to carve a small “u” above and between the “a” and the “l” thereby adding the missing letter and correcting the last name.
One wonders, though, what the Pauley’s thought of their teenage son’s gravestone having a correction for eternity?
Gravely Speaking 