The Tombstone Maker’s Final Irony

The Story of Gustav Hickethier a German Immigrant, Socialist, Atheist, and Monument Maker in Washington County

Long-time members know I love researching the people who lived in our area before us. This is the real history, not presidents and generals, but ordinary (and sometimes extraordinary) people who worked, loved, struggled, and left their mark on Washington County.

What started as curiosity about a maker’s mark on a gravestone “Hickethier & Beier, Portland OR” on a forgotten gravestone in the Cornelius Methodist cemetery unfolded into a fascinating, contradictory, and utterly human story. Meet Gustav Hickethier: The man who made tombstones for everyone else, but died needing a court order to get his own.

THE GERMAN IMMIGRANT CRAFTSMAN

Gustav Hickethier was born around 1848 in Germany and immigrated to Oregon, settling first in Eugene where he married Minnie and had three sons: August, William, and Frank. By 1890, he was running a successful marble and granite monument business at 248 Washington Street in Portland, with property valued at $10,000- a substantial fortune for the era. Gustav was a skilled craftsman who traveled regularly to Washington County, personally delivering and installing tombstones for the German immigrant farming community around Blooming, Cornelius, and Laurel. The 1895 Hillsboro Argus called him “the Portland marble man”, he was well-known and trusted.

The beautiful German-language Behling gravestone in the Blooming Cemetery? Gustav made that. The clasped hands and crown symbolism on little Theodor Behling’s stone in Cornelius Methodist Cemetery? Gustav carved those. His work dots our local cemeteries.

THE CONTRADICTIONS BEGIN

But Gustav Hickethier was no ordinary craftsman. He was a man of fierce contradictions: In November 1894: His wife Minnie divorced him on grounds of “cruel treatment.” She was awarded one-third of his $10,000 estate. The three boys, ages 5-10, somehow ended up living with their father in Washington County. In 1898: Gustav was indicted by a Grand Jury for “brutally assaulting” Frank Miller near Laurel. The case was dismissed on a technicality.

In 1904: Gustav ran for Justice of the Peace in Portland as a SOCIALIST candidate! (He lost.) And here’s the ultimate irony: Gustav spent his days carving Bible verses onto tombstones for deeply religious German Lutheran families… while being a declared ATHEIST himself! His 1906 obituary stated bluntly: “He died as he had lived, an unbeliever in all promises for the future.” No religious services were held.

THE DECLINE

Somewhere between 1894 and 1905, Gustav’s life fell apart: He Lost $8,000 in the divorce settlement and failed business ventures and left Portland to try farming near Laurel. He opened a new marble shop on Main Street next to the Hartrampf store in Hillsboro in 1905. But illness prevented him from doing any business.

By October 1905, Gustav had a tumor on his neck. Two tumors were removed at a Portland hospital. He returned to Hillsboro “feeling jubilant,” ready to restart his business selling monuments and tombstones. But in November, another large tumor was removed from above his ear. This time, he didn’t recover. Gustav Hickethier died on December 30, 1905 at his ranch near Laurel, age 57, leaving behind: Three sons, an ex-wife who had divorced him 11 years earlier, two brothers in Portland, and 46 unsold tombstones sitting in his Hillsboro shop.

THE FINAL IRONY

When Gustav’s estate was inventoried, here’s what the court found:

Assets:

50 acres of land: $1,250

46 tombstones, headstones, footstones and slabs: $653

1 horse: $50

1 mule: $9

2 cows, 1 calf, 20 chickens

Farm tools, a mandolin, two rifles

Cash on hand: $1.17

From $10,000 to $1.17 in eleven years.

His executor was W.O. Donelson of Hillsboro, the mortuary owner who had worked with Gustav for years. The mortician and the monument maker, two halves of the death care industry, business partners to the end. Within 7 weeks of Gustav’s death, Donelson had sold everything: The 46 tombstones were sold in bulk to Imhoff & Miner of Portland for $600. The horse, mule, cows, farm equipment all sold, Total: $865.25

But here’s the stunning part: Gustav’s grave sat unmarked for 8 months. On August 17, 1906, Donelson had to petition the Washington County Court for permission to spend $75 of estate funds to purchase a tombstone for Gustav Hickethier. The man who spent his life making tombstones for others died with 46 unsold stones in his shop – yet needed a court order to get his own monument!

THE LEGACY

Today, you can visit Gustav Hickethier’s grave at Hillsboro Pioneer Cemetery (formerly Odd Fellows Cemetery). That beautiful red granite stone, the one that cost $75 in 1906, purchased by court order, paid for by selling his life’s work, still stands. No Bible verse adorns it. Just his name, death date, and age.

This is Washington County history, not sanitized, not simplified, but real. Complicated people living complicated lives, leaving behind beautiful stones and messy stories. The next time you see an old tombstone in the Blooming Cemetery or Cornelius Methodist Cemetery with beautifully carved clasped hands or a German Bible verse, remember Gustav Hickethier – the contradictory, fascinating man who made it.

He died broke. He died alone. He died an atheist. But his work – marking the final resting places of German immigrant farmers, their children, and the communities they built – still stands throughout Washington County, outlasting the man, the contradictions, and the ironies. What other stories are buried in our local cemeteries, waiting to be told?

Sources: Washington County probate records, Hillsboro Argus newspaper archives (1895-1906), Hillsboro Independent (1906), Oregon census records, Portland city directories, Find A Grave

Research conducted February 2026