(WBBM NEWSRADIO) —A west suburban man who spent more than a decade researching the life of Naperville’s firs murder victim has placed a bronze marker at the man’s gravesite.
Years ago, Dennis Frantzen found a copy of a newspaper clipping from 1869 about the killing of a man in his early-30s named James Laird.
Laird was killed by a jealous husband.
Frantzen says he found out Laird was sheriff in the Dakota Territory and a former newspaperman who was featured in Mark Twain’s autobiography.
“It wasn’t fair for someone that had all these stories he could’ve told us, and he didn’t get the opportunity to, you know?” the 72-year-old Yorkville resident told WBBM Newsradio Thursday.
He said Laird’s original gravestone had faded so much you couldn’t read it. With permission from Laird’s descendants, he placed a marker on the grave in Naperville Cemetery.
“My interest here caused me to do things that I may not have done,” Frantzen said. “I traveled doing research. I met people. It changed my life in certain ways to, I hope, make it better.”
Frantzen hopes to dedicate the marker in August.
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