Man's ashes found in trash, returned to Delaware

It was the night before Mardi Gras in the sleepy bayou town of Houma, Louisiana, a city of 35,000 southwest of New Orleans, when Larry Lilliman found half of a person's ashes in a trash can on the side of a road.

As he often does, Lilliman, 64, was riding his bike along the city's main thoroughfare looking for junk he could salvage. His passion is "repurposing" unwanted items for his own collection and for the poor. That night, he was digging through the trash of a makeshift thrift store he hits twice a week.

Among other things, he packed away a small wooden box. It wasn't until he got home that he noticed the inscription: "Ralph A. Kline: 1953-2003."

And so began a two-month quest to locate Kline's family that ended 1,000 miles away in Frederica, though exactly how his ashes came to be in the garbage is still a mystery.

"When I really realized what it was, I shook the box to see if it had ashes in it," Lilliman said. "It did have ashes in it so I lit a candle and said a little prayer that I do the right thing."

After a month of searching, he finally received help tracking down relatives.

"I couldn't put that back in the trash," Lilliman said. "I would have held onto it forever until someone came along. I wasn't going to release it to anybody but a family member."

He placed a lost-and-found notice in the Houma Courier, the city's local paper.

The Courier wrote a story about Lilliman's find and posted his phone number with his plea for help. Lilliman said the calls came pouring in and eventually reconnected him with an old classmate who used death records to locate Kline's mother, Frederica resident Ellen Stubbs.

"He called me and the only thing I can tell you is my body shook all over and all I could do was cry," said Stubbs. "Knowing (my son) could be in a dump, it is a hard thing for a mother to accept. I can't imagine that someone would do this."

Kline grew up in Claymont and Kent County. At 16, he quit school and joined the U.S. Army. His mother said his love of fishing, food and beer drew him to the bayou state, where he lived most of his life.

"He was stationed different places but when he got to Louisiana, he loved it," Stubbs said. "He said it is more relaxed, and I said 'What is more relaxed than Bowers Beach?'"

Like any mother, she pleaded for him to return home, but settled for the occasional visit and regular Sunday phone calls with her eldest son.

"He was a wonderful son," Stubbs said. "He was a very good-hearted person and he would do anything for everyone if he could."

Kline was living in a bayou town west of Houma when he died in 2003 at age 50. Within four years, Stubbs lost two of her three children and her husband, who was Kline's stepfather.

"Losing my sons was the hardest thing I had ever gone through and this is the second," Stubbs said.

When Kline died, he was engaged to Louisiana resident Cynthia Horn. In an effort to "be nice," Stubbs said she allowed Horn to keep half of Kline's ashes and she got the other half, which have sat in a television cabinet surrounded by glass dolphin sculptures and gathering dust for nearly 15 years.

Her family's relationship with Horn wasn't the best, and she always feared that her box didn't really contain her son's ashes.

But relief came in the mail two Saturdays ago in a brown box labeled "cremated remains" that contained her son's ashes. Stubbs keeps pictures of her sons on her bedroom dresser.

"I went in and told my son's picture that he was home where he belonged, finally home where he belonged," Stubbs said.

It's unclear how Horn's half of Kline's ashes ended up in the trash. Lilliman went back to the thrift shop to inquire.

"She said they picked up so much stuff, she just chucked it in the garbage can," Lilliman said. "She didn't realize what it was."

Stubbs and Lilliman have their theories about how Kline's ashes ended up in the trash. Attempts to reach Horn and the thrift shop owners were unsuccessful.

Regardless of who is responsible, Stubbs said it has been heartbreaking.

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"I just cannot get over the thought that he could have ended up in the dump. I could not have lived with that," Stubbs said.

Stubbs doesn't want the attention but said the story needs to be told so others might be inspired by how Lilliman was determined to help the family of a dead man he never met.

"People have changed through the years. I'm 85, and growing up people were not like they are today. They cared about their neighbors. They cared about other people," Stubbs said. "Today, there are not many who do."

This is not the first time she received a call from down south with surprising news about her son. More than a decade after he died, she was contacted by Kline's daughter in Alabama whom she had never known.

Sitting in her living room surrounded by pictures and mementos of her five grandchildren, twelve great-grandchildren, and one great, great-grandchild, Stubbs said family is everything to her. Lilliman's action has put her mind at ease and her son's ashes will be buried with her when she dies.

"I will never forget this act as long as I live, which may not be too long. I'm 85 years old and I'm not well," Stubbs said with a laugh. "I don't know what to call it but I feel like this is a miracle. Mr. Lilliman is my hero."

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Lilliman said he doesn't want anything in return. He's always scavenged and his home contains a collection of lamps and mirrors and other treasures.

He said the ashes "take the cake" in terms of odd finds and have also been an answered prayer for him. He recently retired from a career in the oil fields, which has given him more time to pursue his passion and think about life, he said.

"I've been doing a lot of praying over the past couple of years," Lilliman said. "Life gets pretty boring when you retire and I really prayed that it could be God's will that I do at least one good thing for someone. I'm surprised it was a lady in Delaware."

Stubbs said Lilliman restored her hope "that there is still good people in this world."

"That man has a spot in heaven," Stubbs said. "That is for sure."

Contact Xerxes Wilson at (302) 324-2787 or xwilson@delawareonline.com. Follow @Ber_Xerxes on Twitter.