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To: tiamat
This is a very spooky "Old Detroit" story about my family.

When my youngest son was born, we couldn't think of a name for him. He was our 6th son, and all the "boy names" of deceased relatives in our family had been all used up. My husband and I pored over baby-naming books and I made a list of names going through the alphabet, A, B, C, etc.

The day came when we HAD to choose a name, so I just took the first name on my list, Aryeh. That was the name we gave our son.

About five years later, I was working at the GM Cadillac facility, and frequently visited the Cadillac assembly line in Hamtramck ("Poletown"). When GM purchased the land for the Poletown plant, they acquired two Catholic churches and an old Jewish cemetery. The churches they pulled down, but since they couldn't relocate the cemetery, they built a 10-foot high brick wall around it.

My mother had given me a clipping of my great-great-grandfather obituary in the Detroit News, 1910, according to which he was brought to rest at the "Chene Street cemetery." Since Chene Street dead-ends at the Poletown plant, I concluded that he must be buried within the GM grounds.

A co-worker and I found out when the cemetery was open for maintenance, and we drove out to Poletown. After walking up and down the rows and looking at all the headstones, we found my g-g-grandfather's stone. His name was Louis, but his Hebrew name was (spooky music) ARYEH!!!

214 posted on 09/07/2003 8:00:51 PM PDT by Alouette (The bombing begins in five minutes.)
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To: Alouette
Wow!

What a cool coincidence!

And you are right, it IS spooky, but in a good sort of way.

Thanks for posting your story.

Tia

222 posted on 09/08/2003 3:39:58 AM PDT by tiamat ("Just a Bronze-Age Gal, Trapped in a Techno World!")
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