It's not fair to die alone, the way Richard M. Dier did.

        A father and retired construction worker, Mr. Dier was 81 years old.

        Five people attended his funeral: the reverend who performed the service; the funeral home director; a fellow resident of a Shelbyville, Ind., convalescent home; a caregiver there; and an Enquirer reporter.

        His family couldn't be found.

        He never had visitors. The couple who signed him in at the home in 1999 disappeared. His court-appointed guardian is dead.

        No one was there to claim him.

        The few who gathered at the funeral service early this month admitted they knew little about Mr. Dier, of Shelbyville, by way of Cincinnati.

        He liked graham crackers, they said, couldn't get enough of them. He played bingo and checkers. He liked to tell riddles.

        And he was always singing, “Kiss me once, and kiss me twice, and kiss me once again. ...” His friends sang a round at his funeral, their voices touched by age, fondness, sadness.

        His body was cremated. An Indiana judge ordered the funeral home, Carmony-Ewing, to hold onto his ashes for six months, in case someone turns up to claim him. After that, the funeral home will donate a burial plot and grave marker, said Dep Ewing, funeral director, “to give him a permanent place.”

        So he won't seem so abandoned.
       

"Sweet old guy'
        Where is his family?

        Nursing home workers said that when they asked, all he'd say was he had several children but “they've gone.”

        After his death, people tried to locate a daughter, Susan Joseph, sole beneficiary of a minuscule insurance policy funded by the city of Cincinnati, for which Mr. Dier worked until 1983. No luck.

        A bank account he had in Cheviot had been emptied and closed in 1996.

        And the young couple who dropped him off three years ago and had promised to be responsible for him? They didn't visit. When they failed to pay his bills, he was put on Medicaid.

        The address they gave in Shelbyville didn't check out.

        Mr. Dier didn't have Alzheimer's disease, though he wasn't up to handling his own affairs.

        “He was really a sweet old guy,” said Emily Alvis, the home's activities director. “It's torn me up that we can't find any relatives.”

        The funeral director said it's a rare funeral where no one — not a neighbor, not a long-lost relative — comes to claim remains.

        “There is no ending here,” Mr. Ewing said.

        “It's sad that you could go through life and have a funeral and nobody comes. There has to be a reason for that.”

"Into the hands of God'
        The Rev. James Horner, a retired pastor, didn't try to guess.

        “Richard Dier must have had some intrinsic talent,” he said. “I wish I'd known him.”

        The reverend likened the small gathering of mourners to the group of women who visited Jesus' grave to attend to his body when no one else would.

        “The women were always there, where many people were afraid to go,” he said. “We commit Richard into the hands of God, who knows what to do. Always did.”

        Richard M. Dier: born Jan. 17, 1921; died Jan. 21, 2002.

        The newspaper obit reads: “Burial will be in Forest Hill Cemetery. No visitation will be observed.”

        Reporter Rebecca Billman attended the funeral and contributed to this report. Anyone who knows of Mr. Dier or his family can contact the funeral home at (317) 392-2555, or the Heritage House Convalescent Center, (317) 398-9781.

        Denise Smith Amos can be reached at 768-8395. Fax 768-8340 or e-mail damos@ enquirer.com.
       

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