| Statement of Significance Summary. The Marshfield I.O.O.F. Cemetery, located in Coos Bay, Oregon, is locally significant for listing on the National Register of Historic Places under Criterion A, Community Planning and Development and Social History, and meets the special registration requirements for cemeteries under Criteria Consideration D, because of its connections with the settlement and development of the City of Marshfield, and the larger Coos Bay region, during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The purchase of the cemetery property by the newly formed Odd Fellows Cemetery Corporation in 1888 corresponded with the region’s development from a rural outpost into an urban center with international connections. Although Coos Bay was discovered as early as 1852, the bay’s isolation precluded the region’s economic expansion until the late nineteenth century. Immigrants, disillusioned gold seekers, displaced Civil War veterans, and other entrepreneurs found opportunities in the Coos Bay region during the last decades of the nineteenth century. The Marshfield I.O.O.F. Cemetery served as the community cemetery for the residents in the Coos Bay region, regardless of their ethnicity or socioeconomic status. The period of significance begins in 1888 with the establishment of the cemetery by the Odd Fellows Cemetery Corporation and ends in 1945 when the City of Coos Bay took active possession of the cemetery following the passage of state legislation that assured city officials that they would be able to use public funds for the cemetery’s upkeep, just as if it was a city park.
Criteria Consideration. The Marshfield I.O.O.F. Cemetery meets the special requirements for National Register listing under Criterion Consideration D because of its important historic associations with the growth and development of the Coos Bay region in the late nineteenth century. At this time, the Coos Bay region was a flourishing community of individuals from around the world, connected internationally by a complex maritime network. A limited number of sites, primarily private houses, have survived from this period and are representative of only a small portion of the people who lived and worked in the region. The Marshfield I.O.O.F. Cemetery is the final resting place for people from twenty-seven countries, representing all socio-economic classes, who collectively succeeded in making Coos Bay the principal port between San Francisco, California and Portland, Oregon, establishing strong maritime and cultural ties worldwide. |
