Cedars - Dorothy Ellen
Source: Crawfordsville Journal 2-2- 1934 (thanks to the wonderful Proctors and their Waynetown Masonic Cemetery database)
Severely burned after her clothing caught fire from a kitchen range, Dorothy Ellen Cedars, four-year-old daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Oscar Cedars, who live five miles southeast of Waynetown, died at 7 o'clock Thursday evening at Culver Hospital here.
The child, horribly burned about the face and body survived only a few hours after her clothing became a mass of flames. Whether a spark from some burning wood in the stove fell on her dress or her clothing became overheated from standing too close to the range could not be determined.
From bits of charred paper found on the kitchen floor, at the Cedars home it is thought possibly that Dorothy Ellen was playing with fire by sticking paper in the front of the stove, her clothing thus catching fire.
Dorothy Ellen, a sister, Margaret age 5 and a brother, Howard, age 2, were playing in the kitchen at the Cedars home southeast of Waynetown between 3 and 4 o'clock Thursday afternoon when their mother, working upstairs was suddenly attracted by their screams.
Mrs. Cedars rushed downstairs to find a flaming figure in the kitchen. The mother toree of the clothing which remained on the girl and then summoned her husband who was at work on the farm and several neighbors.
One neighbor, Mrs. Forest Bolen brought the child and her father to Culver Hospital here.
Mrs. Cedars suffered numerous burns about her hsands and wrists as she struggled to free the child from the flaming clothing but it was not thought that she was seriously burned. She was treated by a Waynetown physician.
Two older brothers of the burning victim, Iva age 11 and Billy, ag e9 were at school at the time of the tragedy.
Besides the child's parents, her three brothers and one sister, three grandparents survive. One, Mrs. Emma Cedars, lives in Waynetown while Mrs. Cedar's parents whose names could not be learned reside in Kokomo.
Dorothy Ellen was born AUg 20, 1929 in the present Cedars home. The body was taken to Waynetown from the local hospital Thursday night.
Funeral services for the little girl will be held at the Christian Union Church Saturday afternoon at 1:30 o'clock. Burial will be in the Waynetown Masonic cemetery. - kbz