La Belle Cemetery (Oconomowoc)

La Belle Cemetery is a very picturesque graveyard located right on the banks of Lac La Belle. It is a fairly large cemetery containing many tombstones and several crypts.


The first thing that I came across in this cemetery was a large hill that was almost made up exclusively by children's graves. It was the largest children's area of a cemetery I have seen.

This statue of a mourning/resting young person felt right at home in a graveyard with an extraordinary amount of children.

There were several areas that were beautifully landscaped in order to deal with the steep hills that surround the lake.


An illustration of how close the cemetery is to the lake. There were a few locations where it was just a few short steps from a gravemarker to the water.


The folklore behind this cemetery was that the girl buried at this tombstone killed herself by simply walking into the lake and drowning. People have reported seeing the ghost of a girl walk into the lake and disappear into the water. It has also been reported that blood appears and drips from the statue's hands.

These stories seemed unlikely after investigating the grave. Both people that were buried at this location were in their 80s when they died. This rules out the young girl committing suicide and haunting her own grave.


I did not notice any fresh blood or any residue of blood on the hands of the statue.


One odd finding was the gravestone of Claus and Johanna Hagemann. Johanna was born in 1857 and died in 1921. Oddly, Claus was born in 1852 but there is no record of his death. He is either the oldest living person or he became some kind of undead vampire or zombie.