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Bone Where There's Not Supposed To Be Any: The Dubuque Third Street Cemetary

Tuesday, March 21, 2017

The 19th century Third Street Cemetery, the first established Catholic cemetery in Dubuque, suffered decades of neglect,multiple episodes of purposeful and inadvertent burial removal,and by the late 20th century was commonly believed to no longer exist. When the land was purchased by a local developer, the removal myth was quickly debunked. From 2007 through 2011, archaeological excavations revealed over 900 burials. The history and bioarchaeology of the Third Street Cemetery provide a fascinating look into Dubuque’s early years, its residents, and the difficulty of separating fact from fiction in historic research. Robin Lillie, recently retired,and Jennifer Mack are Bioarchaeologists with the Iowa Office of the State Archaeologist. Cost: $2.50/adult, $1/child (16 and under) or $5/family.

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