I See Dead People's Graves

From Dave Brigham:

I made a plan on a lovely Saturday last fall to return to Evergreen Cemetery in Boston's Brighton neighborhood, but a crappy football team got in my way. I'd made a few photos there many years ago while taking my son to watch trolleys come and go along the adjacent Green line (see July 18, 2013, "Cool Stones," from the blog's minimalist era).

I wanted to look for more cool gravestones and check out the quaint chapel at the entrance to the cemetery. But about halfway through the relatively short drive from my house, I realized there was a Boston College (2025 record: 2-10) football game slated for that afternoon less than a quarter-mile from my destination, and that parking would be difficult near the graveyard.

So I pivoted, and ended up at Mount Auburn Cemetery.

I've walked through the cemetery many times over the years, and featured it in a post about Watertown (see October 9, 2021, "It's Hip to Be Coolidge Square"). The world-famous boneyard spans Watertown and Cambridge, with the majority of it located in the former.

"Mount Auburn Cemetery was established in 1831 with a most ambitious vision. Within a forested landscape nestled between Cambridge and Watertown, our founders created an extraordinary place, one where the living mourner would come to find solace and the public would come to find inspiration," per the cemetery's web site.

"The founders envisioned the Cemetery as the place where the great and the good of Boston — without restrictions on religion or race — would be remembered and celebrated for all of time in a setting of exceptional beauty. Nearly 190 years [they need to update this part- DB] and more than 100,000 burials later, we continue to honor that founding vision, offering burial space and end-of-life services to families in their time of need and preserving this landscape of memory for 200,000 annual visitors."

This place really is spectacular, a true Greater Boston gem. The trees, the crypts, the paths, the gravestones, the tower - it's like walking through a dreamscape.

I entered off of Grove Street in Watertown, parked and went for a stroll.

In many cemeteries, a tomb like this would be the pinnacle of burial chic. In Mount Auburn, this one elicits reactions such as, "Oh, look, another one with an angel inscribing something on a tablet." Still, amazing.

I was pleasantly surprised to see more modern grave-top adornments.

I wonder if this Samuel Osgood is related to the fourth postmaster of the United States and former member of the Massachusetts and New York legislatures, Samuel Osgood.

I love the signs and the names of the various paths located throughout the cemetery.

A barberry (berberis vulgaris) "is a shrub in the genus Berberis native to the Old World," per Wikipedia. "It produces edible but sharply acidic berries, which people in many countries eat as a tart and refreshing fruit."

I wish I'd made note of the family interred in the massive and stunning crypt in the background.

I wonder if the Legg family buried beneath the cross shown below had anything to do with L'eggs pantyhose.

I've seen graves with coins and stones on them, but this is the first time I've spotted gourds.

There are tableaux like the two shown below everywhere you turn at Mount Auburn.

The most impressive mausoleum I saw -- the cemetery is huge, so there may be others that are more magnificent -- belongs to Ralph Huntington White and his family.

Ralph H. White founded a business in 1853 that grew to include a department store in downtown Boston by the early 1860s, per Wikipedia. R.H. White was acquired by the Filene's department store chain in 1928. Sixteen years later, City Stores, Inc., acquired R.H. White, Wikipedia indicates.

"Both these companies continued the independent existence of the R. H. White brand and store. In 1953 the store celebrated its centennial with a makeover and refurbishment of the flagship store, and various events," Wikipedia continues. "But urban decay had crept up to the lower edge of the downtown shopping area where R. H. White was located (the so-called Combat Zone would soon spring up a few blocks away). By 1956 sales were down and the store was no longer profitable; City Stores closed the flagship downtown store in 1957."

R.H. White soldiered on with branch stores in suburban malls, until City Stores closed the outfit in 1980.

As for White's mausoleum, it was designed by architect Willard Sears, who was known for his work on numerous residences in Boston's Back Bay, as well as other Hub buildings including what is now known as the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.

White's final resting place "looks for all the world like the town hall of a thriving metropolis. The massive cupola, that looks like a bell tower without the bell, is supported by 12 Ionic columns. Circling the top of the dome is a ring of garlands," according to a write-up at Mausoleums.com by Douglas Keister.

The most majestic grave marker I saw was for Charles (1823-1887) and Sarah (1827-1888) Whitney.

From the Mount Auburn Cemetery Instagram: "Charles Whitney...worked with his father and brother in one of the largest lumber enterprises in the United States and gave generously to charitable causes for the poor. For his family lot at Mount Auburn, he commissioned the Italian artist Nicola Cantalamessa-Papotti to carve a large, marble memorial (1883). The sculptor carved the Whitney memorial in Italy. The operatic ensemble, which depicts an angel with outstretched wings surmounting a large sarcophagus, rises majestically on the sloping hill of Oriole Path. A plump putto, a winged figure of a child sits at the base of the sarcophagus holding two floral wreaths."

I encourage you to visit the cemetery at your earliest convenience.