SALT LAKE CITY — What began as a backyard renovation turned into an unexpected mystery for a Salt Lake City homeowner after he uncovered a child’s headstone buried beneath an old deck.
Osvaldo Ocegueda said he had wanted to replace the deck at his home for years. When he finally removed the last board, he noticed what he first thought was a chunk of concrete.
“I brought the broom and I started sweeping,” Ocegueda said. “My heart just went pounding a thousand miles an hour.”
The stone belonged to Elva J. Fessler, a 4-year-old girl who died in 1940.
Wanting to know who she was and how her headstone ended up beneath his home, Ocegueda contacted FOX 13.
As FOX 13 researched Elva’s history, Ocegueda said records he found indicate Elva and her family once lived in the home.
The search then led to Salt Lake City Cemetery, where Elva’s grave is still marked with a headstone.
That discovery raised another question: Why were there two?
Donny DePasquale, owner of Utah Headstone Design, reviewed photographs of both markers and believes the stone found beneath the deck was likely Elva’s original marble headstone.
“I think the headstone was replaced,” DePasquale said.
According to DePasquale, families sometimes replace older marble markers with newer granite monuments because granite is more durable. When a marker is replaced, families are often given the option of keeping the original.
He believes Elva’s family may have kept the original marker after it was replaced.
“That’s very unusual because you would think that they would have taken it with them,” DePasquale said.
While that offers the most likely explanation for why two headstones exist, it does not answer how the original marker ended up buried beneath the deck.
For Ocegueda, however, the investigation brought peace.
“Now I feel so calm,” he said. “Like the person wanted to tell me to come and find it.”
Ocegueda said he now plans to build a small memorial to Elva near the place where her original headstone was discovered.
