Samuel M. W. Hindman moved his family to the Camp Polk meadow between 1868 and 1870. His combined Road Company and homestead parcels totaled 280 acres, known as Hindman Station. This location featured a store, accommodations, meal services, animal feed options, and the first post office, which was the only post office between Prineville and Cascadia.
The Santiam Wagon Road ran through the center of the barn that Samuel built, and the beams of that barn still stand today.
2.1 acres of his holdings became known as Camp Polk Cemetery, established on the knoll east of the barn. The oldest recorded burial in Camp Polk Cemetery is that of Thomas Summers, who was laid to rest there in 1880. It is believed he was buried where earlier burials may have occurred, but none of the markers that could have existed in 1880 remain today.
Samuel Hindman's son, Charley, married Martha (Taylor) Cobb in 1902. Samuel passed away in 1920, and Charley transferred the ranch to Martha, who lived there until her death in 1940. Martha is interred in Camp Polk Cemetery alongside her parents, her sisters Amanda and Etta, and Alfred Cobb, her first husband. Due to significant debts left behind by Martha, her children sold most of the ranch to settle these debts, marking the end of seventy years of Hindman-Cobb family ownership.
In 1941, Nellie Miller, daughter of Ebenezer and Ella Graham—prominent pioneer figures in Sisters since the 1880s—also passed away. The Grahams are buried in Camp Polk Cemetery. At the same time, Nellie’s estate was in probate, and her will allocated $10,497.11 to her niece, Thelma Roberts, for the benefit of the "old cemetery on the knoll." Consequently, Martha’s children deeded the 2.1-acre cemetery knoll and a forty-foot-wide access easement connecting the cemetery with Hindman Road (now Camp Polk Road) to Thelma Roberts, trustee for Camp Polk Cemetery. This easement became known as Cemetery Road, a designation that remains today.
There is no documentation indicating that Thelma Roberts ever utilized the $10,000 for the cemetery. A proposed gravity pipe to channel spring water to the cemetery was never installed, and it remains unclear what became of the bequest from Nellie to Thelma. There is no record of Thelma transferring her ownership to her descendants, resulting in the pioneer cemetery falling into legal limbo. For approximately 82 years, there was no formal caretaker, leading families to stake out burial plots informally, many of which remain unused. Numerous burials lack markers, and many markers are in disarray and difficult to read.
In 1985, the Oregon legislature established the Oregon Mortuary and Cemetery Board (OMCB), assigning it the responsibility of regulating cemeteries. The OMCB created the Certificate of Authority, which is essential for operating a cemetery in Oregon. Without this certificate, interments cannot occur.
Camp Polk Cemetery was designated as a Deschutes County Historic Site in 1986.
Concerned about the long-term preservation of the cemetery, local residents, including a descendant of Martha Taylor Cobb Hindman, formed The Camp Polk Pioneer Cemetery Preservation Committee in 2022. They obtained a Caretaker Permit in October 2022 from the Oregon Parks and Recreation Department, which had declared the cemetery abandoned. The Committee has since weeded, pruned trees, repaired fences, erected signs, and constructed a new tool shed.
After an extensive application process and legal counsel, the Camp Polk Pioneer Cemetery Preservation Committee was awarded ownership of the cemetery by the Circuit Court of Deschutes County on May 30, 2024. The Committee continues to own, protect, and maintain the property today.
The committee previously applied for and later withdrew the request for authority to activate the cemetery through the Oregon Mortuary and Cemetery Board, the goal of the application being to allow occasional interments of pioneer descendents with their families. The process proved to be too costly, and it became evident that running a cemetery was beyond the expertise of any committee member. One of the requirements to activate the cemetery was to submit a map of burials - an impossible task that would require the assistance of "Ground Penetrating Radar," to map the countless unmarked graves, a very costly endeavor. There are also no comprehensive records of burials since all burials since 1985 have been technically illegal.
Currently, the cemetery is inactive and a historic site; burials of any kind are illegal per Oregon statute. The long-term mission of the preservation committee is to safeguard this sacred parcel of land for future generations and to educate the public about its special place in Sisters history.
