NILES — From 10 a.m. to noon Saturday, Silverbrook Cemetery’s deceased residents will likely be joined by a few dozen living area residents.

The annual Silverbrook Cemetery tour will kick off at its entrance on the corner of E. Main and Cherry streets in Niles, across the way from the Niles Fire Department Complex. The tour will last 90 minutes at most and will be followed by refreshments.

While the tour is near the date of Halloween, it is not meant to strike fear but instead strike interest and learning opportunities, said Mollie Kruck Watson, assistant director of the Niles History Center.

Watson is the lead organizer of the event — both the Niles History Center and Friends of Silverbrook Cemetery are putting the tour on. On Saturday, amidst trees fading out of green and into amber colors, Watson will guide the registrants of the event on a walking tour of the cemetery, stopping at pre-determined gravestones of women to share their stories and the impact they made on their communities.

“Cemetery tours are very popular right now,” she said. “A lot of museums do them because they want to highlight the history of the community, and what’s a better way to highlight the history?”

Watson said the idea of touring a cemetery may sound morbid to some, but it is a great way to tell the stories of Niles’ history. Community members can be with community members of the past, rather than inside a history center standing over an exhibit.

The tour will emphasize some of the cemetery’s prominent female residents. The decision to do so was for numerous reasons, Watson said.

In years past, under other themes, most historical figures mentioned were men, she said.

This year and next are also landmark centennial anniversaries in the women’s suffrage movement, which some Niles women now buried in Silverbrook played a role in locally.

On June 10, 1919, Michigan became one of the first states to ratify the 19th Amendment, which gave some women the right to vote. On Aug. 18, 1920, it was ratified nationally.

Watson said she enjoys researching the people the tours highlight. She will read through history center documents, look at artifacts and find additional information in places such as the Niles District Library.

A particularly favorite part of this year’s research was on service organizations of the past, which Watson said were stronger and had more volunteers than some today.

“One of the neat parts of the tour is a lot of the women were involved in the local women’s clubs, so their stories really reflect the larger story told in our women’s clubs,” she said. “The women’s clubs were very active in the community, and we can thank them for some of the parks in the area, some of the markers.”

The tour will include women from the Ladies Historical Society, founded in 1878; the Ladies Library Association, founded in 1881; the Ladies Reading Club, founded in 1882; and the Women’s Progressive League, founded in 1912.

“An influential part of life that keeps the nostalgic, close-knit atmosphere predominant in Niles is the 200-some women’s clubs and service organizations that date back as far as the late 1870s and add to the colorful history of Niles,” said Candace Skalla, president of Friends of Silverbrook Cemetery. “Through donations, contributions and a genuine feeling of pride in their community, Niles’ women groups have made a deep imprint of life in Niles.”

Specific women to be featured include Copenhagen-born aviatrix Dagmar Stegemann, Chapin Mansion owner Ruby Chapin and Alice Quimby, who donated a collection of photographs by Chief Sitting Bull, a 19th century Hunkpapa Lakota leader.

The three women will be portrayed by reenactors during the event, too.

“If there are people who we didn’t highlight that [attendees] like to talk about or know about, I always encourage people to share their stories, too,” Watson said.

Prospective attendees must reserve their spot ahead of time by calling the Niles History Center at (269) 845-4054 or by sending an email to nileshistory@nilesmi.org.