Trail of Tears Memorial in Missouri to reopen April 22

The Trail of Tears Memorial and Herbal Garden near Jerome, Missouri, will hold its grand reopening at 1 p.m. April 22, which is Earth Day.

The Facebook page for the garden announced the event Tuesday. A ribbon-cutting will occur in front of the grounds’ famed entrance arch that day, before the artwork-festooned trail opens to the public.

To get to the property, take Exit 172 from Interstate 44 and head east on Highway D (aka Route 66) towards Jerome. The Trail of Tears site sits less than a half-mile east.

Originally owned by Larry Baggett, the property was set up as a sort of monument to the Cherokee Trail of Tears, which crossed his land. Baggett created his own sculptures and elaborate landscaping using concrete and native rock. He even built his own hot tub in front of his house.

After Baggett died in 2003, his Trail of Tears site deteriorated. Retired military veteran Marie Ryberg bought the closed property in 2016 and, with much help from nearby artist Christopher Richardson, began to restore it. The duo even restored the head of the waving Baggett statue that sits in front of the entrance that was beheaded by vandals.

Shortly after purchasing the property, Ryberg said she wanted to open a small restaurant on the premises. Ryberg said in a phone interview Tuesday the restaurant — which will specialize in raw foods — probably won’t open for another year because she and Richardson are busy fixing  Baggett’s long-neglected hilltop house.

“I will be opening a living-food school next year, with a small cafe, so people can try it,” she said. “Larry also was a vegetarian, and raw foods have given me a lot of health benefits. I want to pass that along.”

Ryberg told Rural Missouri magazine she’d met Baggett about 20 years ago and befriended him.

“I’ve kept all his notes and put them together and read them,” she says. “Now I live that. […]”

Larry was a vegetarian who taught Marie about proper breathing techniques and yoga. She never understood the totality of what he taught her until recently.

“He was such a good man,” she says. “He was like a dad to me. I wish I would have used what he taught me earlier in life.”

We visited Baggett a couple of times before his death. The first time, he was a vigorous and stout-looking old man. The second time, he’d lost about 50 pounds and looked frail. Either way, he came across as a self-taught mystic, learning from astrology, numerology, Native American lore and natural healing.

Baggett saying he’d suffered two heart attacks and suffered from diabetes in his 40s. Because he figured he didn’t have much time left, he built the Trail of Tears as a resort so his wife would earn income after he died.

But all that hard work building the site — plus, he said, consuming cider vinegar and Jerusalem artichoke — cured him of his diabetes and heart trouble. He wound up outliving his wife and lived into his 70s.

(Image of the Trail of Tears Memorial archway near Jerome, Missouri, via Facebook)