Born in Warsaw, Poland, to a
Jewish family, Anna Held often headlined the Folies-Bergere. Later, Held would
claim Paris as her birthplace, shave a few years off her age and convert to
Catholicism upon her marriage to a Uruguayan playboy, Maximo Carrera. With
Carrera, Held had a daughter named Liane. In 1896, Held met Florenz Ziegfeld when
he hired her to be in one of his productions. By 1897 the two were in love and
despite being able to legally marry (her first husband would not grant her a
divorce) they were, after seven years, considered husband and wife by virtue of
New York’s common law. It was Held who inspired the ‘Ziegfeld Follies’. In
1918, Held died at the age of 46 from multiple myeloma, a rare disease at the
time. Her funeral took place at Campbell’s in NYC and was well attended by stars
of the era, save for Ziegfeld who abhorred funerals. Held’s “Empire-Style”
burial site, boasts a stone arch and two benches. Purchased for her by actress Lillian
Russell, Held’s funeral was one of the first to take place in Westchester’s
Gate of Heaven Cemetery. She was memorialized by Carl Sandburg in his poem, An Electric Sign Goes Dark.
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Windows into Long Island's Past
This month's 'American Cemetery & Cremation' magazine contains my article 'Windows into Long Island's Past.' ...


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Hungarian-born journalist and newspaper publisher, Joseph Pulitzer, was born Jozsef Politzer in 1847. Several years after the death of his ...
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One of the most unique mausoleums to be found in Atlanta’s Oakland Cemetery is that of successful Atlanta businessman, Jasper Newton Smith. ...
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At the 1972 funeral of Jackie Robinson, 2,500 people packed Riverside Church in New York City. New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller, NY C...
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Way back when, the first significant monument I was introduced to at Green-Wood was the "bride." So significant was this that I ...
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One of the most ornate monuments in Green-Wood is that of Charlotte Canda, who died in 1845, on her 17th birthday. Canda’s death was th...
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This open –air mausoleum --resembling a gazebo – was built for Marc Antony Zambetti, grandson of the Stella D’Oro Biscuit Company’s found...
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Over the weekend, Green-Wood Cemetery participated in openhousenewyork (sic). One of the highlights this year was the rare opportunity...
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This Norman Revival hillside tomb, which contains the remains of the Lispenard Stewart family, was designed by James Fenwick in 1889. The...
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Infamous 1930s crime lord, Dutch Schultz, is buried beneath a bench-like monument --which bears his birth name, Arthur Flegenheimer—in Hawth...
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This majestic monument marks the grave of Major General Robert Patterson, who fought in both the Mexican-American War and the Civil War.

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