Project searches for families of boys buried at Missouri reform school generations ago
All that remains of roughly two dozen boys, who died many decades ago at a former youth correctional facility in central Missouri, are their graves and death certificates. Likely no detailed stories of what happened to them and why have been passed down through the generations. Just a burial site near the former Missouri Training School in Boonville about 100 miles east of Kansas City. The facility is historically known as the Missouri Reformatory for Boys. But, now, a small group of volunteers — with the guidance of national researchers — hopes to change that. They’re working to identify any living family members and the untold stories of these children who died while confined to the correctional facility between 1909 and 1945. Their causes of death vary, from diseases like measles and tuberculosis to an accident or a drowning. “These boys were members of families and communities, and their stories should not end with an institutional record or a grave,” said Rebba Omer, of Columbia, a youth justice advocate working on the project. “The family members have not forgotten these children. Certainly, their memory lives on. “But the larger community needs to honor these boys and remember them.” The Missouri
