- Lewis County Sirens.com - https://lewiscountysirens.com -

News brief: Wayward cremated remains discovered at Centralia recycler reunited with family

By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter

CHEHALIS – A nephew of Emmett Robert Nesteby, whose cremated remains were found at a Centralia recycling business, picked up his three family members’ remains yesterday but it’s still a mystery how they ended up where they did.

The ashes of three individuals were discovered at Hand ‘n Hand recycling last October and turned over to the Lewis County Coroner’s Office.

They were tucked inside the hollow space of what looked like it was a pedestal base for a sun dial or bird bath.

Coroner Warren McLeod said his staff tried to track down relatives, using funeral home labels attached to the three plastic bags. On Friday, McLeod asked the news media to publicize the names.

TV news reporters found the nephew in Walla Walla before the weekend began.

McLeod said the pedestal turned out to be a product distributed by funeral homes especially made to hold cremated remains. It’s something one might place in a garden.

The nephew traveled to Chehalis yesterday and was extremely grateful for those who returned the remains, McLeod said.

“He wasn’t sure which relative may have had them,” McLeod said.

Nesteby, 76 when he died 13 years ago, is the father of Wayne Nesteby, who was 43, when he died in 1997, according to McLeod. Marjorie Boyer, age 77 when she died in 2004, is the mother, he said.

The senior Nesteby was a decorated WWII veteran, and a memorial with full military honors is on the horizon, according to McLeod.

The coroner hypothesized the pedestal was inadvertently discarded by someone, at some point who probably didn’t know what it held.

The deceased were cremated in Oregon and Arizona, according to the labels.

The coroner’s office had learned of a daughter, Kathleen Colley, who more than a dozen years ago had an Oregon address and phone number. That’s where they hit the dead end.

McLeod said he has now learned Colley lived in Packwood but is dead also. She and her husband lost their property there last year to foreclosure, he said.

It still doesn’t answer the question of how the three ended up at a Centralia recycler though.

“The main thing is, we got them back to their family,” he said.

•••

For background, read “News brief: Partial “urn” with cremated remains turns up at local recycler” from Friday March 15, 2013 at 9:54 a.m., here [1]