Journal-News.com

ELLOW SPRINGS — Selig and Frances Goodman wanted to leave this earth as they lived — simply and humbly, no fuss, no frills.

So that's what they got — a simple cremation and memorial service handled by family, friends and the Memorial Committee of the Yellow Springs Friends Meeting, a Quaker group.

No funeral home, caskets, calling hours or headstones involved, just the way the Quakers like it.

"It doesn't focus on everything being commercial," son David Goodman explained. "It's putting the person's life more in focus on who they are, rather than projecting who they are through a commercial thing like a casket and all the elaboration of a big funeral."

In Ohio, you can care for your departed yourself with no involvement from funeral homes whatsoever.

The Yellow Springs group has done it this way for decades, said Heidi Eastman, the memorial committee's clerk.

"It's a way of keeping the care within the community of the church," said Eastman, who handles arrangements for about two deaths a year. "It's a fair amount of work, but I do feel a lot of people appreciate it."

Eastman's group pre-registers residents who desire its services. It also collects the death certificate and cremation permit, picks up the body and transports it to Woodland Cemetery for cremation, then returns the cremains to the family. The total charge is less than $300, enough to cover expenses.

For Selig Goodman, who died in 1991, his wife and four children scattered his ashes around a White Oak they planted in his name at nearby Ellis Park. The same is planned for Frances, who died in September.

"To me, planting a tree in my mother's or father's name is a lot more potent," David Goodman said. "You're creating life. Yeah, it's just a tree, but it doesn't hurt to have another tree in the world, and you're seeing the tree as a memorial."