Canton, Ohio: Frankenstein's Grave

As you park where the Roadside location is marked, walk up the hill, turn left, and you will see the back of the sign.

Took awhile to figure out how to get into the cemetery. It is located behind the McKinley Monument, but you cannot enter from the monument. The entrance to the cemetery is at the end of 7th Street, which runs alongside one side of the monument Park. Follow the cemetery path to section Z!

The shrubs have been been removed and the grave location in the cemetery is in section Z. As you stand facing the stone, you can see the entrance to Mercy Surgery Center across the highway.

The grave in Canton is a family plot, and no one is named Victor. There is an Augustus and another brother; they were farmers who relocated to Ohio in the early to mid 1800s. I've been to that grave probably a hundred times over the years, starting when I was about 11 or 12, and I'm 43 now. The names have never changed on the headstone. The names are written on the markers in front of the headstone. My husband didn't believe me when I said the Frankensteins were from Canton.

In the shadows of the McKinley Monument in the northwest corner of West Lawn Cemetery, you will find nestled between two small hedges the tombstone of Frankenstein. It's across from Timken Mercy Hospital on 13th Street, at the top of Serpentine Hill.

Although I do not know the true history of the grave, it was always rumored to be the final resting place of Dr. Frankenstein. Rumor has it that a Timken family member in Germany wrote to his successful cousin in America and told him how the grave site of Victor Frankenstein was being defaced and spit upon in their small town. The American Timken and founder of Timken Roller Bearings paid for the remains of the body to be flown to Canton to give Dr. Frankenstein a peaceful resting place.

Every Halloween, as kids, we would dare each other to sit on the tombstone or watch as other kids would have their picture taken beside it.

Also in West Lawn Cemetery you will find the Temporary Tomb of Late President McKinley -- West Lawn's receiving vault was his resting place in Canton, from September 19, 1901 until the nearby McKinley national memorial was completed in 1907. The vault was flanked for six years by uniformed military guard 24 hours a day.