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Welcome
Taphophilia (dot) Com...
A repository of morbid curiosities:
Thanatology and Taphophile Issues, Cemetery,
Funeral Industry and Death Related News.
A Taphophilia Thank You...
Taphophilia (dot) Com would not be possible without the knowledge, experience and talent of DarkestWeb. From its conception and early development, DarkestWeb was faced with many challenges; from inspiring and motivating, to providing guidance and direction. The continued dedication and support has produced results greater than ever expected, and for this, I owe a huge debt of gratitude.
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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!
Green-Wood Cemetery Arcadia Publishing announces the release of Alexandra Mosca's 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 and to browse other available titles!
Men of Mortuaries Calendar
To purchase your 2008 calendar, learn more about the KAMMCARES Foundation, or to be featured in the 2009 calendar, please visit Men of Mortuaries.
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, Indiana's remarkable cemetery sculpture
with photography by John Bower and foreword by Claude Cookman 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.
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Written by DeadGirl
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Friday, 25 February 2005 |
When bodies talk: Forensic anthropologist listens to solve mysteries
By ANGELA PATTERSON,
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February 16, 2005
Most wouldn't consider human decay polite dinner conversation.
But 230 members of the Farragut/West Knox Chamber of Commerce ate eggs and drank coffee at Fox Den Country Club Feb. 8, listening to Dr. Bill Bass' talk on forensic anthropology and the Forensic Anthropology Center, better known as the Body Farm.
For 40 minutes, Bass turned the dining room into a college classroom, and all eyes were fixed on him as he showed crime-scene depictions and pictures of decaying body parts. He often made jokes about the fact he works with dead bodies, a subject he said makes many uncomfortable.
"Americans don't like the idea of death," Bass said, as he showed the cover of his book, "Death's Acre," which has been translated into 16 languages. "We don't see dead bodies; we cover them up at a crime scene. Death is more acceptable in other countries."
But while some may shy away from death and decomposition, Bass has made it his life's work. Bass created the Forensic Anthropology department in the early 1970s at the University of Tennessee after working as a forensic anthropologist for the state. He created the Body Farm so students could study and analyze human remains in a realistic environment.
"We started the facility in 1980, and we research and document what happens to human's bodies when they die," Bass said. "The major question in every case is 'How long has the person been dead?' That's what we study."
Rather than simply talking about what he and his students do, he gave the audience a case in point. Bass told the story of a 34-year-old white male named Madison Rutherford who was reported to have died in a car fire while on a trip to Mexico. It was later discovered that Rutherford had $7 million in life insurance policies, so the insurance company hired Bass to go to Mexico to make a positive identification of Rutherford's remains. But when he arrived at the scene, he knew something didn't add up.
Bass looked at vertebrae, bones from the neck and the skull to discover it wasn't Rutherford who died in the car fire.
"The person who burned in that was a 50-60-year-old Mexican peasant, not Rutherford," Bass said. "The insurance company said they wouldn't pay, and months later, they found Madison Rutherford working as a financial planner in Boston. He spent five years in prison for fraud. If it wasn't for people like me, people would get away with things like this."
But Bass admits he doesn't always identify all the bodies he gets, such as one girl who he said was 13 and killed in Campbell County.
"We've never been able to identify her," Bass said. "She was never even reported missing. We try to do everything we can to identify people. There are some you'd like to identify, like this girl, but it just doesn't work the way that it should."
Nonetheless, Bass and his students keep working to identify the ones they can. They receive bodies from the state, bodies that have been donated to science, and others that were specifically willed to the Body Farm. In 2004, 74 bodies were donated.
"You want to make sure you have a good vehicle for transport, because you don't want to be in the same compartment with them as they begin to smell. If you do, the last 380 miles from Memphis to here, you'll be driving with your head hanging out the window," Bass said, as people laughed at the comment and the slide of his transport vehicle, an F-150 with a camper top on it.
Even though some would consider such a field a morbid subject to make your life's work, Bass has found it very gratifying.
"This work is a challenge," Bass said. "I never view my work as just a dead body. It's a challenge to see if I have the ability to identify them. Many of the people I identify have been done in. Hopefully, my investigation will allow me to bring a criminal to justice. Not everyone has the ability to do this kind of work, so I use my ability as a way to help families and the public as much as I can."
http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/west_sentinel/article/0,1406,KNS_18096_3546977,00.html |
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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
Quote Repository
“What seems to us but dim funeral tapers may be heaven's distant lamps.” Longfellow
Shirtless and Sculpted
The Men of Mortuaries 2008 Calendar is now available! All sale proceeds benefit KAMMCARES, a breast cancer foundation.
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