DECEMBER 2018 • NEBRASKAland 11
of explosives.
MacDonald survived, but had to have his left leg
amputated above the knee. While he lay in the hospital, his
wife, mother, and two sisters took his leg to the cemetery
for burial in a child-sized casket transported to the grave by
a hearse. MacDonald later returned to the police force and
retired in about 1923 with a captain's pension.
The 1928 article noted that MacDonald now "gets about
right well" using only a cane. Each Memorial Day he went
to the cemetery to place flowers on the grave where his leg
was buried under a headstone that read, "J. R. MACDONALD /
LEG 1922."
"It's a kind of queer feeling to stand by the side of your
grave – to know that part of you is standing above ground
active and well, and the rest of you, your body, I mean, lies
below, dead and buried," MacDonald said. "But it was a
good leg; it served me for many years, and I'm not going to
forget it."
Though the 1928 story is whimsical, the leg burial
had a serious point behind it. The family was apparently
celebrating the fact that they didn't have to bury the rest of
their husband and father. A week after the 1921 shootout,
the World-Herald had run an editorial titled "The Police
Problem," in which it observed that "a policeman's lot is not
a happy one," and that a patrolman "takes his life in hand
to protect the community which pays him a very modest
stipend to serve as the monitor of law and order."
The rest of James McDonald joined his missing leg at
Westlawn-Hillcrest Memorial Park after his death in 1932.
The "Leg" headstone was replaced with a more conventional
one with the inscription: "He fought a good fight." ■
Visit History Nebraska's website at history.nebraska.gov.
A real photo of the "leg" headstone, and an artist's
version of the shootout. Omaha World-Herald,
Dec. 30, 1928.
