Cedarview Dry Valley Eclipse Long's Seneca Virginia
In July 1890, a covered wagon came to the Chauncey Tucker home located about 30 miles southwest of Mullen, Nebraska. That wagon contained a young couple and their three-month-old baby. They asked for food for themselves and milk for the baby. She was very ill with dysentery and appeared to have been severely neglected. The couple insisted Mrs. Tucker keep the baby since they had no way to care for it. Mrs. Tucker already had four children with another one on the way so she didn't take the baby but suggested that the couple go to the Dave Edwards family who lived down the road. The Edwards family agreed to keep the baby until the young couple could come and get it. However, they never returned and no one ever heard anymore from them.
The little girl, who had been very sick, seemed to be getting stronger. Suddenly, a few weeks later she fell into convulsions and died. Chauncey Tucker selected a site on the northwest corner of his tree claim for the grave. They laid the unknown baby to rest in a grave marked “Our Baby.”
As more people in the area died, Mr. Tucker eventually fenced a part of the land for a community cemetery. In 1900 a post office was established in the Tucker home and it was called the Eclipse Post Office so it was natural to call the community cemetery the Eclipse Cemetery. Funeral services were held in homes or schoolhouses by a group of neighbors. The Tuckers usually invited mourners to their house for coffee and food, no matter what the weather. It also became an area custom for families to gather at the cemetery on Memorial Day to care for the graves.
Since there was so much cemetery activity, the people of the area really wanted a church. The Eclipse Church building was started in 1916 and dedicated in 1918. The money for the church was raised by the community and then matched by the Episcopal Church.
The cemetery serves as a final resting place for over 100 pioneers and their families and is still in used today.