My husband was the third of three sons but early in our relationship I remember hearing about two "lost" babies - one boy miscarried at 4 months and one born alive at 8 months, Pamela Jean. Over the years I learned that she was born with what I believe was Anophtalmia - a birth defect where a baby is born without one or both eyes. My mother-in-law told me that in addition to having no eyes at birth, she also had heart defects. But other than that, she never talked much about Pamela.
When I started this genealogy journey, I asked my mother-in-law about Pamela's date of birth, death, burial, etc., and she said she didn't know. She thought it was somewhere between the years of 1951 and 1955 since that's when two of her sons were born. But nothing else.
As I started researching, I stumbled upon information for Pamela. Date of birth was 22 May 1952 and after a short life of just 54 minutes, she died at 8:20 a.m.
I find it interesting that the cause of death is not listed. Is that common to not have that on a death certificate?
And from the death certificate I found her burial place - Alta Mesa Cemetery - and after an e-mail exchange with a cemetery employee, I learned that she was cremated and placed in Community Niche A, Ct. of the Stars #2 in Mausoleum #2.
When I told my mother-in-law about this information, she was stunned as she said at the time of death she told her husband to take care of the arrangements but either apparently never asked, or didn't remember, where she was interred.
So Pamela Jean Ast, you have not been forgotten. RIP, sweet baby.
