Gardens of Stone --- A Cemetery Blog by Alexandra Kathryn Mosca

  Buried beneath this monument is Ralph Adrian Gushee who for 41 years was the proprietor of Manhattan’s Claremont Inn. The restaurant was a “hot spot” in its time, welcoming guests like President William McKinley and Admiral George Dewey. Gushee and his family lived in an apartment above the restaurant and was waked there when he died in 1933. That same year, prohibition ended and newly elected Mayor Fiorello La Guardia pushed for the remodeling of the Claremont Inn, insisting that its traditionally high prices become more affordable. Robert Moses undertook the project, and on May 1, 1935, the Claremont Inn had a grand reopening with a reported crowd of 500 patrons. In the late 1940s, the Inn's popularity waned, signaling its inevitable end. In 1951, as the city began the demolition, an unexpected event unfolded. A fire, sparked by coals, ignited the old structure, hastening its demise. The remnants of the Inn were then torn down. Today, a playground stands on the site where the I...

  My article: "The Power of Eternal Love: Unforgettable Love Stories That Transcend Even Death" is the cover story for this month's American Cemetery & Cremation magazine.  The cover shot is of the monument artist Marc Chagall designed for his beloved wife, Bella, when she died at the age of 49. Other love stories include Charles & Jane Griffith (Green-Wood), Jonathan & Mary Reed (Evergreen) Lawrence and Elvira Wegielski (Woodlawn) William Wetmore Story & Emelyn (Protestant Cemetery in Rome).  

  After completing a book --  The Truth About Chickamauga -- which chronicles one of the  bloodiest battles of the Civil War, and in which his father, a Brigadier General, fought,  Archibald Gracie IV rewarded himself with a trip to Europe, booking his return passage on the RMS Titanic. Awakened by  “a sudden shock and noise forward on the starboard side"   just before midnight on April 14, 1912, Gracie learned that the Titanic had struck an iceberg. In the time between the collision and its sinking, Gracie helped the crew load lifeboats and made sure that a number of women traveling alone got spaces on them. Pulled beneath the water, Gracie  surfaced and spotted a lifeboat, which he managed to reach, helping several other men onto the safety of the lifeboat.  After the tragedy, Gracie began work on a book about the sinking of the Titanic. However, eight months later he became the first adult survivor to die from health issues brought about by h...

Ten years after I first saw the mausoleum of  hotel I returned for another visit.   The mausoleum, designed in 1927 by the well-known architect Franklin Naylor. Naylor considered it to be the largest and most intricate design of his career and published a pamphlet detailing the construction process. The structure, which blends Beaux-Arts and Renaissance Revival architecture, is one of the largest private mausoleums in the world.

Archibald Gracie IV was instrumental in saving the lives of a number of fellow RMS Titanic passengers. Gracie, too, survived and began work on a book about that tragic night. Sadly, Gracie died eight months later from the effects of his ordeal in the sea. His book, titled "Titanic: A Survivor's Story" was published posthumously. Gracie is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx, surrounded by many family graves. The Gracie ancestral home serves as the New York City mayoral residence.

  This stately mausoleum, with Egyptian overtones, houses the remains of Richard Kyle Fox in Woodlawn cemetery.   Fox , who was born in Belfast Ireland , published the popular National Police Gazette From 1877-1922. In its heyday the publication --which sold for a dime --had a circulation of 500,000 and a readership in the millions.

In honor of tomorrow's Thanksgiving Day Parade, Rowland H. Macy is today's subject.  Born to a Quaker family in New England, Macy found success --and made retail history-- with R.H. Macy & Co., which opened in 1858 in lower Manhattan. First-day sales amounted to $11.06. Macy died in Paris in 1877, just a few weeks after traveling to Europe with his family for some much-needed rest on the advice of his doctors. According to a New York Times article that announced his death, "Laborious work during his best years brought him, at the age of 56, to a sick bed, suffering from Bright's disease of the kidneys, of which he died." However, his funeral was not held until June 29th. After a religious service in New York City's Church of the Holy Trinity, with family and friends and 300 of Macy's employees, Macy's body was taken by special train to the Bronx for burial in Woodlawn Cemetery. In his will, Macy left the bulk of his estate to his wife and daughter,...

Woolworth founder Frank Winfield Woolworth is entombed within this imposing, Egyptian-themed mausoleum in Woodlawn Cemetery. Designed by architect John Russell Pope -- whose designs also include The Jefferson Memorial and the National Archives and Records Administration --the Woolworth mausoleum boasts twin guardian sphinxes, Egyptian carvings, papyrus-styled columns, and Bronze doors with figures exchanging an  ankh  (the Egyptian symbol for life).  In 1879, Woolworth opened his first “Five and Ten Cent Store” in Utica, NY. Although that store soon failed, his second store, which opened later that year and was located in Lancaster, PA, was a rousing success. Over the years, more than a thousand F. W. Woolworth Company locations opened worldwide.  Woolworth died suddenly in 1919, at age 66, in Winfield Hall, his Long Island mansion. Initially, his estate was estimated to be $65,000,000. That amount was later reported to be just under $30,000,000. The Woolworth B...

At the age of 22, George Ehret left Germany to join his father --a brewer --in New York. Within ten years --in 1866-- he established the Hell Gate Brewery, named for its location near Hell's Gate on the East River in Manhattan. For a good part of the late 19th Century, Hell Gate Brewery was the country’s largest brewer, rivaling Anheuser-Busch Pabst and Schlitz. Ehret chronicled his success in a book he published in 1891: Twenty-Five Years of Brewing with an Illustrated History of American Beer. In addition to the brewery, Ehret amassed substantial real estate holdings in New York City, many of which were rental properties. As both a boss and landlord, Ehret was benevolent. Perhaps his kindness and philanthropic ways were part of the reason that more than 2000 people--–including the German Ambassador--attended his funeral mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in January of 1927, when he died at the age of 92. Ehret was entombed in the family mausoleum in Woodlawn Cemetery, joining...

Hungarian-born journalist and newspaper publisher, Joseph Pulitzer, was born Jozsef Politzer in 1847. Several years after the death of his father--and after the family’s reversal of fortune--Pulitzer emigrated to the united States. Trying his hand at a variety of jobs, Pulitzer eventually found his true calling as a journalist. In his lifetime, he owned both the New York World and the St. Louis Post Dispatch. Yet, it was what his considerable wealth made possible after his death that has made the Pulitzer name synonymous with Journalism: In 1912, the fist school of journalism was established at Columbia University and in 1917, the first Pulitzer Prizes were awarded. In October 1911, Pulitzer died unexpectedly aboard his yacht in South Carolina’s Charleston Harbor, at the age of 64. The boat had been en route to Pulitzer’s winter home in Jekyll Island, Georgia, when a hurricane threatened. “Leise, ganz leise, ganz leise (softly, quite softly), were said to be his last words. On the...

Missouri-born James Cash Penney was the 7th of 12 children born, in 1875,  to James Sr. --a farmer and Baptist minister--and his wife Mary. As a child, when he wasn’t attending school, James worked on the family farm. His father stressed the value of money and by the time James was eight years old, he was expected to pay for his own clothing. Penney began his work in retail at J. M. Hale and Brothers dry good store, shortly after he graduated from high school. Before long, he was trained as a salesman. In 1902, James Cash Penney opened his first store named Golden Rule for the credo by which Penney lived and did business. His business and personal philosophy paid off : By 1912, there were 34 Golden Rule stores across the country. In 1913, the name was changed to the J.C. Penney Co. and the company headquarters were relocated to NYC.   Penney died at the age of 95, on February 12, 1971, in New York’s Columbia Presbyterian Hospital. His funeral service took place several ...

This spectacular Renaissance Revival domed structure was designed in 1927 by architect Franklin Naylor. Built at a cost of more than $260,000, it boasts an authentic Tiffany stained glass window with a religious theme. Naylor considered this one of his most intricate works and the largest private mausoleum in America. For these reasons, he published a pamphlet about the mausoleum’s construction. Initially built for Dominico Dumbra -- the proprietor of a winery during prohibition -- the building was sold to hotel magnate Julius Manger in 1935. Manger, who graduated from Tulane University Law School, practiced law for a time before partnering with his brother, William, in real estate. Beginning their new venture in Galveston, the pair later relocated to New York City, where 500 homes were built under their watch in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. Soon after, the brothers began their successful acquisition of hotels. Their holdings eventually included luxury hotels in Chicago, Boston, Washington, an...

The mausoleum of Oliver Hazard Perry Belmont and his wife, Alva Smith Vanderbilt Belmont, is situated in a prominent spot in the Whitewood section of Woodlawn Cemetery. Designed by preeminent architect Richard Morris Hunt -- Metropolitan Museum of Art, Statue of Liberty pedestal, Biltmore Estate, Ashville NC, The Breakers, Newport RI --the mausoleum is a replica of St. Hubert's Chapel at Chateau Amboise in France, in which Leonardo DaVinci's remains are interred. Oliver Belmont's lineage was an illustrious one: The son of August Belmont Sr., whose money helped fund Belmont Park, and Caroline Perry, the daughter of Commodore Perry. He was married to the former Alva Smith Vanderbilt, a prominent figure in the women's suffrage movement.  Oliver Belmont, a financier and thoroughbred enthusiast, died on June 10, 1908, from peritonitis after surgery for a ruptured appendix. Only ten days before his bout with appendicitis, Belmont was healthy and hale, spending time with his ...

Clarence Day authored several books in his time, but the 1935 publication of  Life With Father  was his most significant and enduring. A staple in English Lit classes, the book is an autobiographical account of Day's young life with his family, peppered with humorous anecdotes about his Wall Street broker father. Published in 1935, the book was later-- in 1939-- adapted as a Broadway play. On the heels of its closing, in 1947,  Life With Father  was released as a movie, co-starring a teenage Elizabeth Taylor. From 1953 to 1955,  Life With Father  was given a new life, this time as a television show. Clarence Day did not live to see the influence his work would have on popular culture as he died the same year as the book's publication. Yet, his earlier words seem prophetic now:  "The world of books is the most remarkable creation of man. Nothing else that he builds ever lasts. Monuments fall, nations perish, civilizations grow old and die out, and,...

One of the most poignant love stories to be found in Woodlawn Cemetery is that of Lawrence and Elvira Wegielski. The New York Times apparently thought so too, judging by their 2003 feature NEW YORK LORE; Love, Unstoppable, which chronicles a devotion that transcends death. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/09/nyregion/new-york-lore-love-unstoppable.html?src=pm

On July 22, 2003 -- a day that both NY’s Governor and NYC’s Mayor declared “Celia Cruz” day – the Queen of Salsa joined other music greats-- Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, Irving Berlin, George M. Cohan--in eternal slumber in Woodlawn Cemetery. Celia Cruz’s mausoleum in the venerable Bronx cemetery took a year to complete. It is open and airy with two-foot windows on either side, as it was Cruz’s wish that even in death she would be accessible to her multitude of fans. Visible on a shelf inside the structure are photos and mementoes of the joyous life she lived.