Wally

This unfortunately marred picture is our older brother, Walter Eugene Shook. He died, so the family story goes, shortly before his first birthday, of pneumonia. Dad made his coffin, a family friend dug the grave, and Wally was buried the next day without being embalmed. Mom and Dad were too poor to afford a stone, so they dug Wally's grave at a 90 degree angle to the other graves in the Las Palomas graveyard. Mom and Dad had lost their first boy's grave (see an earlier post), and they didn't want to lose Wally's. Later, our aunt Elizabeth had a small bronze marker made for Wally. Wally's grave overlooks the Rio Grande.