More Hiking and an Old Cemetery

The Weldon Spring Conservation Area is mostly empty land now but it once was home to several hundred families whose homes, farms, schools, and shops were scattered around the bluffs overlooking the Missouri River, just across from St. Louis County. Later, after the U.S. government kicked everyone out (using eminent domain laws), it became home to ammo bunkers, a chemical plant, a TNT factory, and a uranium enrichment plant — all of which landed this area on the EPA Superfund list.

That mess has, thankfully, been cleaned up and the land allowed to return to its natural state. But scattered throughout are hints of the past including several old, semi-abandoned cemeteries. The Daniels Cemetery is about a mile hike into the woods along an unmapped trail. The Daniels’ homestead was nearby but so far we haven’t been able to find any remnants of it.