This monument, a tribute to Daniel Boone and his wife Rebecca was built by John Haley in 1860. In 1862, Robert E. Launitz added four marble panels depicting scenes from Daniel and Rebecca’s lives. One showed Daniel fighting two Native Americans. Another showed Rebecca milking a cow. A third showed Daniel speaking to a boy, and the fourth showed him in front of a cabin with deer he had killed.
The panels were vandalized during the Civil War and restored in 1906 and restored again in the 1940’s after a tree fell on them. Only one of the original panels still exists and is on display at Waveland State Historic Site in Lexington.
The monument has a controversial history: In the 1840’s Judge Mason Brown and other community leaders decided to create a new cemetery. They thought it would help to promote the new cemetery to have famous people buried there. At that time Daniel Boone was buried in Missouri. Representatives of the cemetery convinced Boone’s son to allow them to rebury his parents’ remains in the new cemetery. This is where the story takes an interesting twist.
Although everyone agrees that Rebecca Boone is now buried in the Frankfort Cemetery, there is considerable controversy about where Daniel is buried. According to lore, Daniel outlived his wife by so many years that by the time he died, the spot next to Rebecca was occupied, so Daniel was buried at her feet. If this is true, Daniel Boone is still buried in Missouri and some unknown person is buried beside Rebecca in Frankfort. Nonetheless, this monument honors the life of Daniel and Rebecca Boone.
