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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.
Announcements
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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Graveyard of the Atlantic |
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Written by DeadGirl
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Monday, 27 June 2005 |
Museum's relics give poignant testimony to the history of N.C.'s treacherous shoals
By David Rolfe
JOURNAL REPORTER AND PHOTOGRAPHER
HATTERAS - At the end of the road on Hatteras Island stands a building that is slowly filling with the remnants of dashed hopes, broken dreams and tragedy - the Graveyard of the Atlantic Museum.
The shallow waters off the North Carolina coast, long known as the Graveyard of the Atlantic, are littered with the hulks of broken ships. The beaches were once strewn with timbers, cargo and castaways, caught by the trap of hidden shoals and the powerful Gulf Stream just offshore.
The tragic stories of those victims of the sea, the bravery of their rescuers and poignant relics from the proud ships that came to grief off the Outer Banks live again within the walls of the museum, which sits next to the Coast Guard station and the Hatteras Ferry landing.
The design of the 18,000 square-foot museum offers a clue to the treasures behind its doors. The entrance portico is framed by weathered timbers resembling the naked ribs of a shipwreck, topped by a row of flagpoles that look like masts.
Visitors will find a World War II Enigma machine submerged in a transparent tank of greenish water. The machine, a famous encryption device used by Germany, was recovered from a sunken U-boat, the U-85, which sits in 100 feet of water off Cape Hatteras. The U-85 has the doleful distinction of being the first U-boat sunk in U.S. waters during World War II and is a war grave of 46 German sailors.
Relics from the loss of the USS Huron, which wrecked off Nags Head in 1877, rest on maroon fabric in a glass case. They are mundane things - silver tablespoons, brass keys, coins, a leather shoe. Even a lump of coal can raise a lump in the throat when you realize it was on a ship that was pounded to bits one night and that a hundred men met their death in the freezing surf.
Nearby is a wooden model of the Carroll A. Deering, carved by a local barber from a piece of that wreck. The Deering, known today as the Ghost Ship of Diamond Shoals, was found stranded on the shoals in 1921 with her sails set and crew missing. Theories abound, but no one really knows what happened on the proud white ship, just three years into what should have been a long career at sea.
The largest relic currently on display is the radio shack used by Gen. Billy Mitchell, the father of the U.S. Air Force. Mitchell came to the Outer Banks in 1923 to prove that aircraft could sink warships. Taking off from an improvised airstrip at Buxton, Mitchell's biplanes bombed two obsolete battleships and sent them to the bottom in less than an hour.
The museum is also home to the lamp assembly from the 1803 Cape Hatteras Lighthouse, removed and hidden by Confederates when Union forces overran the area during the Civil War. Lost and scattered for more than a century, the delicate prisms of the Fresnel lamp are still finding their way into the museum.
Other relics of Outer Banks history and lore, mementos of tragedy and heroism, are still coming to the museum from closets, attics and mantels of island homes. Eventually, artifacts from the Union ironclad USS Monitor, lost in a storm off Cape Hatteras and only recently salvaged, will join the exhibit.
Getting there: The Graveyard of the Atlantic Museum is about 370 miles east of Winston-Salem in Hatteras Village.
Hours: The museum is open daily from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Admission is free until construction is completed.
For more information and directions: Call (252) 986-2995 or go to www.graveyardoftheatlantic.com
http://www.journalnow.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=WSJ%2FMGArticle%2FWSJ_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1031783460991&path=!living&s=1037645509005 |
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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
“Men fear death, as children fear to go in the dark; and as that natural fear in children is increased with tales, so is the other.” Francis Bacon
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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