There will be a time when you believe you are finished….
​That will be the beginning.

Fox 9 ~ Mary McGuire 

Halcyon Cemetery in Lake Elmo is now open after a long legal fight over its creation that went all the way to the Minnesota Supreme Court.
(FOX 9) - Halcyon Cemetery in Lake Elmo is the definition of a true family affair.
For starters, the ceremony space used to be Lee Rossow's parents' actual home. The land the house was built on was already zoned for a cemetery, so Lee had the idea to open one for the community after his parents and his wife dies nearly a decade ago.
"I became disenchanted with the services and the availability, and the way things were handled when somebody died and I thought, there's probably a better way of handling it," said Rossow.
But the process of starting a cemetery in Minnesota isn't simple, and Lee fought the City of Lake Elmo to open - a fight he took all the way to the Minnesota Supreme Court.
He ended up winning after the Minnesota Supreme Court refused to hear the case, and the Rossow family was finally able to open their doors last month. Lee's parents, Marge and Roy, now rest peacefully at the entrance in an ornate mausoleum.
Another member of the family- Lee's niece, Rochelle Jacobs, serves as the manager of the cemetery, the same place where she used to spend Christmas with her grandparents.
"To have this be my place that I come to work every day now and I can share it with the community... it's a wonderful thing," said Jacobs. "This isn't just a business. This is really a place where we are honoring our family and theirs at the same time."
The cemetery is non-denominational and a non-profit. They not only serve their customers, but also provide a place for the forgotten.
The cemetery has a dedicated space that serves as the final resting place for 97 individuals from across the state who died with nothing and no one to bury them, making their funeral home a true home for all.
"They were just sitting there. Nobody was picking them up... we wanted to honor them... we wanted them to come here," said Jacobs.
Mary McGuire, FOX 9 New. 8/2/22

Our Cemetery offers what we felt was lacking in traditional offerings.
Although we are non-denominational, we welcome and will incorporate
​your beliefs and wishes. Many people have alternative ideas and we want to help make those wishes a reality.

"Here we are an open slate right now. A family could pick any area, by the pond or by a tree, the options are endless and the possibilities are plenty"

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 Unique cemetery opens in Lake Elmo following long legal fight.
By BOB SHAW | Pioneer Press PUBLISHED: February 5, 2022 at 6:03 a.m. | UPDATED: February 7, 2022 at 5:13 p.m.
After a long legal fight with the city of Lake Elmo, Lee Rossow is opening his cemetery. Along the way he went to the state Supreme Court and survived the deaths of his wife and parents.
Halcyon Cemetery owner Lee Rossow poses with a monument erected for homeless people on the Lake Elmo site where he buried the cremated remains of 97 people. (Bob Shaw / Pioneer Press)As Rossow recently gave a tour of the cemetery, he reflected on the journey he made to open the place. The 14-year struggle, he said, gave him an understanding of what people need during times of grief.
“I believe this will help people through the worst days of their lives,” said Rossow, 75. His new nonprofit – Halcyon Cemetery – opened last month in Lake Elmo, a 10-acre facility as quirky in many ways as its owner.
A BETTER WAY TO GRIEVEHe never thought of starting a cemetery until his father died in 2008, and his mom in 2011. He repeatedly trudged through the process of setting up the long, expensive and unsatisfying funerals.
“I felt after all those deaths that there had to be a better way,” said Rossow. But he was busy, as the founder and CEO of Centerline Charter Corp., which provides buses to area schools.
The death of wife Geni in 2014 cemented his resolve to build a better way to grieve.
“Geni’s death was like a boot in my ass,” he said. “It was, “Let’s get going!”’
He got the idea of turning his parents’ 1985 house into a funeral home. They had both died in that house, and he wanted to turn the entire site into a cemetery that would preserve their memory.
OBJECTIONS FROM NEIGHBORSHis dream hit a roadblock at city hall.
The cemetery was allowed by city zoning, and it was approved by the Planning Commission. But the City Council rejected it, citing objections from neighbors.
Rossow sued the city, which prevailed in district court. He then appealed, and won the case in appellate court. The city took the case to the Minnesota Supreme Court in 2018 — and lost when the high court refused to hear it. Then Rossow got to work.
“I have been told I am ‘U-nee-que’ in the industry,” said Rossow, pronouncing “unique” to make it sound funny.
ONE-STOP SHOPs he rebuilt the structure, he wanted to preserve as much of the original house as possible, which is why the original fireplace is the centerpiece of building. Today, his parents peer down from a portrait on the mantle, his mother perched on a piano. Rossow created a “U-nee-que” entry monument in the parking lot — the caskets of his parents, side by side. Keeping his own unhappy funerals in mind, he designed a kind of one-stop shop for grieving families.
He wanted to host every aspect of the funeral — the service, the burial and the after-party — in one place.
He built a spacious meeting room for the services. A 180-foot shelf lines the room, the future home of mementos and photos of every loved one in the cemetery. Why does all the art have a nautical theme? “This was what I had in my house,” explained Rossow.
VAULTS, MAUSOLEUM Outside, he has already dug holes for 60 concrete vaults, and buried them under about two feet of soil. That will allow him to scrape the dirt, put one or two caskets in each vault, re-bury it and replace the sod — all in one day.
Behind the remodeled house sits a mausoleum, like a giant chest with drawers for the ashes of 64 loved ones. Each can be engraved with a photo, such as the image of Rossow’s boat, next to the drawer for his wife’s remains.
Next to it is a round columbarium with 144 smaller drawers. A unique feature is in the center — an open spot where he will place put cremains in canvas pouches. This will be an affordable alternative to burials, he said.
Then, a few steps away, he showed an even cheaper option. In one corner of the cemetery he has buried the ashes of 97 people who died penniless — remains acquired from Metro First Call, a Savage-based business that provides services for the local funeral industry.
For those remains, Rossow dug a two-foot-wide, six-foot-deep hole and placed the ashes in it. It was covered with soil, then marked with a numbered concrete stone.
‘THOSE WHO DIED WITH NOTHING’In his office, Rossow will keep records of the names of people under each stone, but there will be no record of names at the gravesite. The area is marked by a black stone with the inscription: “We proudly accept the remains of those who died with nothing.”
Below the inscription is a number — 337 — which repeatedly appears elsewhere around the cemetery.
Is it a Biblical verse? A mystical sign?
No, Lee Rossow explains. It’s another “U-nee-que” touch — his name, upside down and backwards, which he stamped on his creation the way an artist signs a finished painting.