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What's New at Arcadia

Historic Burial Grounds of the New Hampshire Seacoast By Glenn A. Knoblock

Arcadia Publishing has releases a new title in the Images of America series, the historic account of the cemeteries along the New Hampshire Seacoast. This collection is a must for anyone interested in local history, genealogy, or colonial-era art. Please visit Arcadia Publishing to purchase your copy of Historic Burial Grounds of the New Hampshire Seacoast and browse other cemetery books!

Green-Wood Cemetery By Alexandra Mosca

Arcadia Publishing announces the release of the historic account of one of New York's most famous cemeteries. Aracdia Publishing's Images of America series has an extensive catalog of many cemetery publications! Please visit Arcadia Publishing to purchase your copy of Green-Wood Cemetery.

Announcements

Quoting Death in Early Modern England: The Poetics of Epitaphs Beyond the Tomb By Scott L. Newstok

An innovative study of the Renaissance practice of making epitaphic gestures within other English genres. A poetics of quotation uncovers the ways in which writers including Shakespeare, Marlowe, Holinshed, Sidney, Jonson, Donne, and Elizabeth I have recited these texts within new contexts. Visit Palgrave Macmillan and purchase your copy today!

Living by the Dead By Ellen Ashdown with illustrations by Mary Liz Moody.

A memoir about living beside a cemetery--and about the members of my family who came to rest at Roselawn Cemetery in Tallahassee, Florida. Please visit Kitsune Books for more information.

Graveyards of Chicago: The People, History, Art, and Lore of Cook County Cemeteries By Matt Hucke And Ursula Bielski.

Discover a Chicago That Exists Just Beneath the Surface - About Six Feet Under! Take a tour of Chicago's permanent residents! Please visit the Lake Claremont Press website to purchase your copy of Graveyards of Chicago today!

Epitaphs: The Magazine for Cemetery Lovers By Cemetery Lovers

For information regarding subscriptions, single issues, submission guidelines, deadlines, classifieds or advertising for future issues, please visit The Cemetery Club.

Guardians of the Soul: Angels and Innocents, Mourners and Saints with photography by John Bower and foreword by Claude Cookman

Indiana's remarkable cemetery sculpture is now available. Please visit Studio Indiana for more information.

West Springfield Massachusetts: Stories Carved in Stone by Rusty Clark

Features information on early New England gravestone carvers with more than two hundred photos and illustrations. Please visit the Dog Pond Press website.

Syndicate

Going Out in Style: Glitzy Funeral Home Opens in Florida! PDF Print E-mail
Written by DeadGirl   
Friday, 20 January 2006
With up to a $700,000 price tag per lavish internment, red jade, Greek chandeliers, imported marble, companion couches and air-conditioned mausoleums, to name just a few of the amenities, it appears even in death we are unequal. The Shmooze
Going Out in Style — Glitzy Funeral Home Opens in Fla.
By SARA LISS
January 20, 2006

A developer in Boca Raton, Fla., is expanding the trend of "luxury development" to include a posh cemetery where deceased can be ensconced in marble mausoleums resembling the Western Wall with price tags of up to $700,000.

Some are calling the Gardens Memorial Park, developed by entrepreneur David Goldstein, an upscale graveyard, though he insists it is a tribute to life. Such lavish touches as red jade, Jerusalem stone and Greek chandeliers elevate the Gardens above most competitors in the busy South Florida funeral industry.

The air-conditioned mausoleums will function as a peaceful sanctuary for the living — a place for them to reflect, pay respects to memories and admire the imaginative use of opulent material. Several themed burial chambers incorporate inspired uses of art and classical architecture. The "Beit Chaim," or House of Life, is a sanctuary whose avowed theme is Jewish faith. Marble hallways lead a visitor through a reproduction of Michelangelo's famed "Creation of Adam" painting (on the wall in this location, not the ceiling), past metalwork gates and into a mini version of the Western Wall, complete with handwritten prayer notes tucked into the cracks.

There's also a Christian-oriented sanctuary whose religious iconography is chosen for its evocative associations and is meant to serve as a hushed respite where one can meditate on the lives of those who have passed on.

"We're a celebration-of-life park," Goldstein told the Forward. "There's nothing to remind you of sadness. The buildings are extremely comforting. You might think you're walking into a fine museum."

Spanning 20 acres, the site comprises extensive botanical gardens, lavish crypts and enough room, eventually, for 235,000 remains (135,000 full-body interments and 100,000 cremated remains). Though still under construction, the development when finished will have cost about $125 million and a dozen years' work.

It's no small feat for a man who came into the funeral business by chance. His diverse work experience includes playing in a successful rock band; designing, owning and operating nursing homes, hospitals and hotels; starting a mortgage company, and developing waterfront housing.

The Gardens features such amenities as "couch crypts," where couples can be buried in side-by-side caskets. There are options for the deceased to be interred in marble mausoleums with the remains of their pets. But the deluxe afterlife is not for the thin-walleted crowd. Prices begin at $1,800 for a single cremation niche and ascend to six figures for private tombs.

In addition to burial services, the Gardens serves the community by offering interdenominational prayer sessions, art classes for children and seniors, and events for social causes. Summing the guiding credo of the organization, Goldstein said, "Our philosophy is that everybody is and was an important person and we want to recognize them as such."

http://www.forward.com/articles/7246
 
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Taphophilia?

taphophilia (taf′ō-fil′ē-ă)

ORIGIN:
From the Greek words taphos, meaning "tomb" or "sepulcher" and philia, meaning "attraction or affinity to something, in particular the love or obsession with something"

DEFINITION: 1. An excessive interest in graves and cemeteries. 2. A love or fondness for funerals, graves, and cemeteries. 3. In psychiatry, a morbid attraction to graves and cemeteries

Taphophilia Facts

Ancient Egyptians used nitre, a naturally occurring potassium nitrite, to cure the bodies of the dead. Those who could afford it received elaborate embalming, with palm wine and perfume; the poor were injected with a cheap preservative.
 

Taphophiles Speak

Final Destination After Cremation?
 
Roadside Memorials...
 
What is your favorite type of cemetery?
 
Will you be embalmed?
 
Are you considering a Green Burial?
 

Quote Repository

“Show me your cemeteries, and I will tell you what kind of people you have.”

Benjamin Franklin1706-1790

Grave Epigrams

Here lie interred the dreadfully bruised and lacerated bodies of William Bradbury and Thomas, his son, both of Greenfield, who were together savagely murdered in an unusually horrid manner on Monday Night April 2, 1832:

Such and interest did their tragic end excite
That, ere they were removed from human sight,
Thousands on thousands daily came to see
The bloody scene of the catastrophe...

Saddleworth Church Graveyard
Yorkshire, England 1832

 

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