William Henry Bonivich was a free spirit, a generous man who left behind no money for funeral expenses.
He was buried Friday, alongside the cremated remains of eight other men and women in a ceremony held by the Fayette County Coroner's Office for the unclaimed dead.
Roger Victor, chief field investigator for the office, strongly believes everyone deserves a ceremony and mourners at the end of life.
For 20 years, he has quietly ensured a dignified farewell for almost 200 people at the Fayette County Cemetery. Victor spends his free time tending the North Union cemetery. He lines up ministers for the public burials, held for the unclaimed dead twice a year.
"Usually people just don't have the money," Victor said.
The coroner's office has held the services for two decades.
"We kind of ran into it," Victor said. "We took a homicide victim out here. We couldn't identify him. He turned out to be a prisoner who had just been released."
His family was not interested in providing for a burial, he said.
Since then, the office has met the need to honor the lives of those whose bodies are not claimed.
Bonivich, 70, was mourned by almost a dozen family members, who brought flowers and a star to mark the final resting place of the man they loved.
Linda Waltermeyer said her father was funny, generous and hard-headed.
"He loved to fish," said Waltermeyer, of Uniontown. "He always wore cowboy boots. He was a truck driver, cross-country. He had a free spirit. And he loved to pull pranks."
He died April 19.
Christine Sloan of Penn Hills, Waltermeyer's sister, clutched a bouquet and a red, white and blue star marker for her father's grave.
"We didn't have any choice," she said of the family's decision to not claim Bonivich's body for private burial. "We are all living paycheck to paycheck."
Her father left no money for a funeral, Waltermeyer said.
A minister, county employees and strangers came to show their respects for Bonivich and the other eight.
Pastor David McElroy, a deputy coroner and minister of East Liberty Presbyterian Church in Vanderbilt, spoke and addressed the space, the "dash," between one's date of birth and death.
"There is a life lived there," he said.
He then read the names of the deceased: Ethel V. Black, 89; Melissa Ann Smith, 39; Donald W. Show, no age available; Thomas McManus, 80; Louis Stanley Grake Jr., 66; Gloria Drumm, 67; Hugh A. Gorley, 79; Jane D. Brown, 90; and Bonivich.
Victor publishes the names of those scheduled for burial in a local newspaper. Sometimes family members recognize a name and attend the service, he said, but not often.
Vicki Hartsek of Uniontown had never attended any of the ceremonies before yesterday.
"I'm from a big family," she said. "We always had comfort around us. It was sad to think of no one being at your funeral. I just thought it was appropriate for someone to be here."
The county pays the cremation fee, if no source of financing, including public assistance or Social Security Insurance, is available. Area funeral homes perform the service and provide markers for each of the unclaimed, with name and date of birth and death.
The honor guard from AMVETS Post 103 in Hopwood held a service for Grake, a veteran. Three volleys were fired, and taps was played.
When the cemetery was nearly empty, Victor lifted a shovel and began covering the small graves with dirt. When he finished, he placed the flowers and the star atop Bonivich's grave.
"That's where the best part of it comes from," Victor said of the ceremony. "From the families."
