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Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Garden Cemeteries of New England

Garden Cemeteries of New England

Hardcover

Environmental StudiesNortheastRegional: New England

Currently unavailable to order

ISBN10: 1608939073
ISBN13: 9781608939077
Publisher: Down East Books
Published: Aug 22 2019
Pages: 344
Weight: 1.65
Height: 1.20 Width: 6.30 Depth: 9.10
Language: English
In 1831 a new entity appeared on the American landscape: the garden cemetery. Meant to be places where the living could enjoy peace, tranquility and beauty, as well as to provide a final resting place for the dead, the garden cemeteries would forever change the culture of death and burial in the United States. The ideal cemetery would become one in which ornamental trees, bushes, flowers, and waterways graced the ever more artistic (for those who could afford them) monuments to the dead. Previous to the 1830s, the deceased were buried in church lots, in small and soon overcrowded public lots, and even, occasionally in backyards and fields. Graves were often untended, weeds and decay soon took over, and the frequently used wooden grave markers rotted away. Some turned to a movement emerging in Europe, in which horticulture was starting to become a factor in cemetery planning, at a time in which cemetery planning itself was a novel idea. New England was the first region in America to take up the new ideals.

The first such cemetery, Mt. Auburn, opened in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1831, and Mount Hope Cemetery, in Bangor, Maine, followed in 1834. Today, these cemeteries are both beautiful places to visit and important historical sites. The author takes readers on a historical tour of eighteen of the Northeast's garden cemeteries, exploring the landscape architecture, the stunning beauty, and delving into the rich history of both the sites and of those who are buried there.

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