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Taphophilia (dot) Com...
A repository of morbid curiosities:
Thanatology and Taphophile Issues, Cemetery,
Funeral Industry and Death Related News.
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.
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Thursday, 02 June 2005 |
Colma, Calif., Is A City Dedicated To The Dead
By RON FRANSCELL
Published on 5/29/2005
Colma, Calif. -- Even the most adventurous traveler ends up in the same destination as everyone else, but you won't find the brochure at your local travel agency.
However, you can get a preview of the end of the line in Colma, Calif. And if you're a diehard “taphophile†— a lover of cemeteries — a day trip to this peculiar village just south of San Francisco is better than an eternity anyway.
Colma is unique on Earth. “We're the only city we know of that was founded to protect the dead,†says Dorothy Bechtol, a docent at the Colma Historical Association.
San Francisco outlawed burials in 1902, when living space on the peninsula got cramped. Maybe dead folks didn't care, but families wanted a resting place that was final and close, and Colma was it.
The fight to keep San Francisco's existing cemeteries raged until 1942, when the last bodies were exhumed from the city's Laurel Hill Cemetery and buried in a mass grave in corpse-friendly Colma.
And Colma, embracing its reputation as the “city of the silent,†welcomed its new “citizens.†In 1892, Roman Catholic Archbishop Patrick Riordan consecrated a potato field as a new Catholic cemetery, and, by 1924, Colma had incorporated as the world's only necropolis, a city where the dead still outnumber the living.
Tiny Colma — less than 2 square miles — now has about 2 million residents, only 1,100 of whom are breathing. Thus, the town's motto: “It's great to be alive in Colma.â€
Travelers will find no restaurants, hotels or grocery stores in town, but there are 16 sprawling cemeteries, eight tombstone carvers, 10 florists, a historic Irish pub, and, inexplicably, 12 car dealers.
Don't fret, though: All the necessary food, lodging, shopping and other services can be found just six blocks away in bustling Daly City, Calif., or five miles north in San Francisco.
For a tax-deductible donation, the Colma Historical Association will arrange group and private tours of both famous and often-overlooked sites.
But a self-guided tour is like life itself.
The gravely serious taphophile who enjoys wandering through peaceful cemeteries without the dead-weight of a tour guide can find many prominent graves on his or her own. Among them:
• The ashes of Wyatt Earp (1848-1929) are buried in his wife Josie's family plot in Hills of Eternity Memorial Park, a Jewish cemetery. Earp wasn't Jewish.
• Hall of Famer Joe DiMaggio (1914-1999), who played for the New York Yankees from 1936 to 1951 and still holds the record-hitting streak of 56 consecutive games, is buried in Holy Cross Cemetery — a day's drive from the grave of his famous ex-wife, Marilyn Monroe, where he had roses delivered daily during his life. Curiously, his headstone makes no reference to baseball.
• Newspaper mogul William Randolph Hearst (1863-1951) is buried in a large family plot at Cypress Lawn Memorial Park, along with his U.S. Senator-father, George.
• Arthur “Doc†Barker (1899-1939), the infamous gangster son of Ma Barker who was killed in an escape attempt from Alcatraz in 1939, is buried in Olivet Cemetery in an unmarked grave.
• Jeans magnate Levi Strauss (1829-1902), whose copper-riveted invention outfitted gold-fevered Forty Niners and rock stars alike, is in Home of Peace Cemetery.
The funeral cortege for divine madman Emperor Joshua Norton I (1819-1880), who crowned himself emperor of the United States and protector of Mexico, was 2 miles long.
As many as 30,000 people attended his funeral at San Francisco's Masonic Cemetery, whose 40,000 “residents†were later moved to a mass grave in Colma's Woodlawn Cemetery. The Masonic Cemetery's suddenly surplus tombstones were used to fill the Golden Gate Bridge's approaches.
The cremated remains of Ishi, believed to be the last known member of the Yahi Indian tribe and California's last link to a Stone Age culture, are in an urn at the Olivet Cemetery columbarium. Captured in 1911 in the northern California wilderness, Ishi was brought to the University of California-San Francisco, where he died in 1916.
More obscure personalities are scattered throughout the fault-carved valley, including literary doyenne Gertrude Atherton, Manson victim Abigail Folger, baseball pitcher Lefty O'Doul, slot-machine inventor Charlie Fey, sugar magnate Claus Spreckels, muckraking journalist Lincoln Steffens, assassinated San Francisco Mayor George Moscone, and California Gov. Edmund “Pat†Brown.
Legend also has it pop diva Tina Turner's beloved dog is buried in a Colma pet cemetery, wrapped in his owner's mink coat.
But among the dignified ranks of headstones, crypts, columbaria and mausoleums, one also will find poignant reminders of lives well lived. Touching epitaphs are engraved in many languages, some stones bearing photos. If Colma has been a blessing for the displaced dead of San Francisco, it also remains a tender reminder of the last destination every traveler will visit.
But look on the bright side: This is one trip where losing your baggage is a blessing
http://www.theday.com/eng/web/news/re.aspx?re=c5cc1b8a-f103-4cf0-a8c3-14425c6b3815 |
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