Burial at Sea

When it comes to the idea of “burial at sea,” I’m probably influenced more by the romanticism of the idea than anything else. My guess is that most of my readers are too. When it comes to the cold, hard facts of how someone gets buried at sea, I’m in a rather wobbly boat. So it was with great interest and fascination that I phoned Captain Johnnie Lee, the proprietor of Long Beach, California’s “Burials at Sea” service.

Queen Mary in background

Amidst the pleasure cruise docks, tourist traps, and the Queen Mary in Long Beach, California, is an interesting sign on Pine Street’s Dock 5: “Burials at Sea, by Captain Johnnie Lee (310) 387-0587.” I was in Long Beach a couple weeks ago, so I went down to the docks and phoned Captain Lee. Unfortunately, he was not at his boat at the time, so I only conducted a phone interview with him. He was very forthcoming with his information, and after I told him I’d like to interview him for my Cemetery Traveler blog, he invited me to the boat the next day. Unfortunately, I was in the midst of a teaching engagement at the Convention Center and so had very limited time.

The idea of burial at sea is intriguing to me, so I had many questions about it. What you see below is as close as I can get to a transcript of our conversation. I took notes while sitting on the pier across from his boat on a sunny Saturday afternoon in June, 2013.

Dock 5, Long Beach, California: location of Captain Lee's vessel

After I returned home to Philadelphia and read up on the subject, I found this excerpt from Captain Lee’s website. I’ll let it set the stage for the interview:

Capt. Lee, alongside his vessel, "The Great Faith" (ref.)

Image above and text below are from the website, “Burials at Sea by Captain Johnnie Lee:”

Scattering of ashes and a Sea Burial Ceremony is a time honored tradition. Widely accepted throughout the world, and becoming even more so considering factors such as cost, land use and environmental concerns, and acknowledged in the Book of Revelations, Chapter 20, Verse 13:
"And the Sea gave up her dead that were in it...."


Interview with Captain Johnnie Lee of “Burials at Sea”

CT: How many burials do you do?
JL: Three or four families per day on the weekend, and maybe one or two during the week. I’ve been doing this for about fifteen years. My business has grown to approximately 400 services annually.

CT: I assume we’re talking about ashes, not whole bodies?
JL: Correct. I do not do full body burials, just cremains. For full body burial, you have to go further out and you must be in at least 600 feet of water. You must also weigh the body down.

CT: How far out to sea do you go?
JL: Two to three miles – the law requires a minimum of five hundred yards.

CT: I hadn’t thought of that - there are laws and regulations …
JL: I am certified and licensed, as well as registered with the state [California Cemetery and Funeral Bureau] Cemetery Bureau.

I should note that my interview was done right off the top of my head. I called Captain Lee spur-of-the-moment, and I truly appreciate his graciousness and patience with me. So my questions kind of jumped all over the place, often being spurred in a new direction based on unexpected information imparted to me by Captain Lee.

CT: I assume your burials are somber events?
JL: Not really, it’s not sad. It’s peaceful, tranquil. The ocean helps a lot.

Image from the brochure shown above.

CT: How do you actually drop the ashes into the sea?
JL: I lower them into the ocean in a basket covered with red rose petals. When the last of the petals have floated away, I bring the basket back up.

CT: Sort of analogous to lowering a casket into the ground.
JL: Not really. It’s a scattering at sea.

CT: It seems romantic, something I don’t remember seeing anywhere on the East Coast.
JL: It’s not so much romantic – scattering at sea is part of the Asian, Indian, Hindu, and Buddhist culture, but is becoming widely accepted by all people.

CT: For others, whose religion does not dictate a water burial, it seems like there is no actual closure, no tangible memory left of the deceased – no grave to visit.
JL: The event is one of release and tranquility; each one is unique. I give each family an 8 1/2" X 11" certificate that has a seascape in the background, with their loved one's name, date the service was performed, GPS coordinates of the exact burial site, and my signature.

Image from the website "Burials at Sea by Captain Johnnie Lee"

[Captain Lee added, in a later conversation, "One of the advantages of a burial at sea service vs. the traditional, is you don't have to wait for business hours to go visit your loved ones.  Just go to the ocean, anywhere near the ocean, and you can have that closeness."]

CT: Do you get repeat business?
JL: Oh, yes many people who go out with me decide right then, that they want this type of service for themselves.

CT: Do you have any extraordinary recollections from your years of providing this service?
JL: Weather conditions. Choppy seas. On my first service, I let the surviving family member release the ashes overboard and the wind blew them back at us. Since then, I designed the basket approach.

End of Interview

I have to say that Captain Lee in no way thought this final comment humorous – he was very serious and treated the matter with the utmost respect. The honor and dignity afforded to the process and people involved by Captain Lee was quite obvious. My interview ended there with his invitation to meet me at his boat the next day. Unfortunately I could not do this.

One of the intriguing questions regarding a burial at sea service would be, “How much does it cost?” I have copied the full fee schedule from the Captain Lee's Burials at Sea website:

Fee Schedule

Witnessed Burials at Sea: $450.00 for 1 to 6 people on board when departing from Long Beach or Alamitos Bay*, $500.00 for 1 to 6 people on board when departing from Huntington Harbor. An affiliate vessel that carries up to 149 people on board is available. Please call Capt. John for pricing of this vessel. Fees are payable by Personal Check, Cash or Major Credit Card. Payments by Credit Card must be made two days before the planned departure date. Payments with Cash or Check may be made when we return to shore.

Permits: Client families are required to obtain the Burial At Sea Permit from their Mortuary, Crematory or local Department of Health, and bring it with them on the day that we depart. I will execute and file the Department of Health Permit with the appropriate agencies, with copies to my client family and Mortuary.
Non-Witnessed Burials, where I scatter the cremated remains without the family on board: $100.00 per scattering, payable upon receipt of cremated remains, and Permit.

Extended cruises and special requests may be accommodated.

* Note: An additional fee of $100.00 applies to Alamitos Bay departures only, payable directly to the Alamitos Bay Harbor Master.

Further Reading and References:

Burials at Sea by Captain Johnnie Lee website
Burial at sea, Wikipedia

Angel Skies

In a prior lifetime, I lived near a cemetery. Whenever I was home and the sky grew dark with an approaching storm, I would always check to see if the setting sun was also throwing bright horizontal light on the buildings in my neighborhood. If the conditions were such, I called this an “Angel Sky,” perfect (for me) lighting conditions for photographing cemetery angel statues. It was my personal, yet skewed version of "Rembrandt lighting," portrait lighting in which part of the figure is directly lit while a portion of it is in shadow.

Statue in Holy Cross Cemetery

I would jump in the car with my camera gear (always loaded with the right film!) and drive the two miles to Holy Cross Cemetery in Yeadon, Pennsylvania (a southwestern suburb of Philadelphia), to photograph the statues. This didn’t happen as often as I would have liked, but still, I made some great photographs over the years. Here's an example (at right) of one of those early images.

Fast forward a dozen years and I’m living in South Philly, eleven miles from Laurel Hill Cemetery. Laurel Hill is the closest cemetery to my house now - that is, the closest cemetery that has statues placed high enough off the ground that will allow me to take full advantage of an angel sky. Through city traffic, that’s a minimum of a half hour drive. So now when the atmospheric conditions are right, it is more difficult for me to make the most of it. Therefore, in most cases, I just curse my ill luck and go back to doing whatever I was doing, ignoring the sky.

This past Friday evening (in June), I looked out my window and the sky to the east was almost black! Not only that, but the late spring sun was blazing brightly low on the horizon (it was around seven p.m.). Assuming I’d never make it to Laurel Hill in time, I called my friend Frank who lives there (!) and asked him go out into the cemetery and make great photographs. I would enjoy the conditions vicariously through his work. He said, “Well, come on up.” It’s very convenient having friends who will unlock the gates for you at a moment’s notice! (Most cemeteries around Philadelphia are locked up at night.)

William F. Hughes, Philadelphia Hay King

I told him I couldn’t possibly get there in time and hung up. My wife said, “Go.” Was the long trip through ridiculous traffic worth ten minutes of actual shooting time? Arghh! Decisions! I dropped off my wife and our 3.8 year-old daughter at the neighbors’ for pizza, jumped in the turbo Saab and tore up the parkway. I called Frank and told him that I was on my way. Like William Hughes (statue at right) might have said, best to make hay while the sun shines (Hughes made a fortune as a hay marketer in mid-1800s Philadelphia). Frank said he’d put beers in the freezer and added, “There’s a rainbow over the cemetery.” Blast him. I dodged all the slow-moving traffic where I could and made it to Laurel Hill in about twenty minutes.

I arrived to find the lighting conditions still good! Score! I’m golden, literally and figuratively. The white marble statues were painted yellow by the sun. If only the darned things would have the common decency to be facing the right direction! Ah, well, one takes what one can get. I shot mostly in color, whereas in the past, I would have done all black and white. The intense golden saturated colors were too good to pass up!


The rainbow was gone, but there were about twenty minutes of sunlight left and the eastern sky was still dark! We jumped into Frank’s truck and sped off to the best part of the cemetery for front-lit statues. We utilized those last twenty minutes of sunlight quite efficiently, shooting a half dozen or so angels and other monuments in their gorgeous contrasty golden splendor. Soon after, the light grew dim and the sun lowered itself behind the trees across the western shore of the Schuylkill River. We retired to his patio for beers as we watched the azure sky grow darker over the hillside graves behind Laurel Hill’s gatehouse.

"TearDrop Memories" and the Mourning Arts

If you’re at all into the mourning arts, you owe it to yourself to visit a shop in New Hope, Pennsylvania, called TearDrop Memories. The proprietor, Greg, is well-versed on the subject and can be wildly entertaining and informative. If you’re also into antique bird cages, he has them as well. I’ve never asked him about the connection – I’m sure there is one.

Pre-Civil War Hair Work Memorial

I just made my second visit to TearDrop Memories in six months. I suppose it will be a routine stop for me from now on when I visit New Hope or Lambertville (in Jersey, just across the river). Greg’s shop is unparalleled as to the extent of his collection, all but one item of which is for sale (you can ask him what that singular item is!). He has an inventory of thousands, large and small. Yes there are coffins and Victorian mourning attire, but there are also death masks and fine examples of Victorian mourning jewelry. (All the close-up images of mourning art pieces in this article are from TearDrop Memories' website.)

Check this out on Amazon.com

If you’re unfamiliar with mourning arts items, there’s a good book called Mourning Art and Jewelry (2004), by Maureen DeLorme. According to the author, decorative art to commemorate and memorialize the dead reached its zenith in beauty and popularity in the Victorian era. When the husband of Britain’s Queen Victoria, Prince Albert, died in 1861, Victoria went into a period of mourning that was unheard of up to that time. She eventually emerged from her overwhelming grief, and although she resumed her official duties, she dressed in black crepe for the remainder of her life. An entire industry of mourning arts grew out of this.

DeLorme explains: “Life spans were short … with the average age of Victorians at death being forty to forty-five.” Due to prevalent wars and the filth and grime of cities in the throes of the Industrial Revolution, people frequently did not live past the age of seventeen. Out of respect for the dead and a desire to preserve their memory, things like hair jewelry and mourning clothing were invented.  DeLorme states:

“Thus the pressures of continually facing death as an intrusion into everyday family life made the need to keep both the presence of the “Lost Beloved” near while simultaneously bidding farewell, a preoccupation. Victorians met this need by creating an extensive mourning culture employing elaborate mourning dress, jewelry, and funeral trappings; memorial portraits (both drawn and painted); postmortem photographs; sculptures, busts, and death masks; and a myriad of commemorative artifacts.”

Example of Victorian Mourning Jewelry:

Human hair Memento Mori Remembrance Mourning Brooch

And by no means was this mourning culture isolated to Britain - mourning arts spread across the United States as well. You can see hundreds of full-color examples of these memorial items, with their histories, in DeLorme's book. You can also see most of them in person at TearDrop Memories. I’ve included in this article some photos I took in the shop, and you can see more on Greg’s website. Honestly, until you see such objects up close or hold them in your hand, you cannot fully appreciate their intense human connection.

Scene inside TearDrop Memories Antiques, showing Victorian bird cages

TearDrop Memories is located at 12 West Mechanic Street in New Hope (click for map), a block up the hill from New Hope’s storied Main Street (two blocks south of the bridge over to Lambertville). If you’ve never been to New Hope, you’re in for a surprise. This little town has a most intense tourist trade! Custom automobiles cruise the main street on sunny Sunday afternoons, while packs of deafening Harleys rumble by. In a four-block length of road, its not unusual to find fifty motorcycles parked. Leathers and feathers co-exist among the shops as well as on the shoppers themselves. Leaving the tourist traps one can veer up Mechanic Street past the quiet coffee shops and restaurants to number twelve, a storefront that welcomes you with an antique birdcage and an arrow inviting you down the steps to the back of the building, where TearDrop Memories is located. Goth girls, couples, and Victorian enthusiasts alike amble in to the small shop at a regular rate.

Greg Cristiano of TearDrop Memories

Outside on his patio, Greg stands a bird cage on a pole with a child’s white coffin propped against it. A curious juxtaposition for Main Street tourists to see. Once lured in, TearDrop Memories can certainly give you the willies. However, the one thing you can never fear is the act of asking questions. Greg, the owner, is most engaging, entertaining, and I might add, extremely well-schooled on his subject. He has been in this business since about 1996. He supplies both private collectors as well as cemeteries and museums with authentic mourning arts items.

Photo from TearDrop Memories' website

What can you find at TearDrop Memories?

One of  many displays at TearDrop Memories

Probably many things you never knew existed, like antique embalming pumps, mourning jewelry, wall hangings, clothing, memorial plates and other ceramics, coffin handles, coffin name plates, oh yes, coffins themselves. There are books, creepy dolls, death masks, post-mortem photographs, antique funeral parlor signs from when undertakers also built furniture. Many of the wall hangings and many of the brooches, pins, and rings incorporate the woven hair of the deceased (think weeping willow trees made of human hair). All in all, TearDrop Memories is a fabulous history lesson in our seldom discussed past.

Image from TearDrop Memories' website

On my most recent visit, I asked Greg to show me the weirdest thing in his shop. I won’t tell you what it was, but I’m guessing if you asked him on a different day, he’d pull something even more shocking out from under the counter! This place is not for the faint of heart. On one of the walls hangs an 8 by 10 inch lithographic remembrance of a child’s death (maybe from the late 1800s) – with four small coffin handles surrounding a little broken white porcelain angel. I commented “Why would you want something that grotesque hanging in your home reminding you of your child’s death?” Greg very astutely pointed out that it was one of the few things the family had to remind them of their child, not simply its death. He added, “Photography was invented in 1840, but it really wasn’t until after the 1910s that people could actually afford to have their picture taken. Up until then most people only had their photograph taken once in their lifetime.  So they wanted SOME tangible memory of the child.

Post Mortem Ambrotype Photo 1850

As a photographer, I obviously have a soft spot in my heart for photographs and photography. I never thought about how precious a photograph could be, or used to be. Back in the Victorian era (1837 – 1901), it was a major life event to have your photograph taken. So after a child’s death, a remembrance of some sort was needed. I’m sure that if the cost of a photograph was great, the cost of a commissioned oil painting must have been out of most people’s reach. That said, people who had the money at the time of their child’s death would sometimes have a post-mortem photograph made of the child. Such photos might show the child in a coffin or dressed up and sitting up in a chair. Sometimes open eyes were painted on the closed eyelids, so as to appear alive, the way the family wanted to remember the child. TearDrop Memories has photographs of this sort for sale.

Queen Victoria Mourning Pin

The items in Greg’s store (and on his various websites, listed below) are not inexpensive. Even (at the time) throwaway Queen Victoria commemorative death pins can cost forty dollars. But you must remember that most of Greg’s inventory is unique, like the human beings they were designed to memorialize. So if you need an antique wicker casket or old marble headstones, this is the place to get them. Unlike the epitaphs carved on grave markers, Greg’s hours are not set in stone. It’s best to call him (215-862-3401) and leave a message regarding the day you’re planning to come by. He’ll phone you back and most likely have the door open for you whenever you’d like to stop in.

References and Further Information:

TearDrop Memories Antiques website
TearDrop Memories photos on Yelp site

Visit TearDrop Memories' web shops for great antique treasures:
http://www.TearDropMemories.com
http://www.NorthForkPets.com
http://www.MaidensMemoirs.com
http://www.WeSpeakAntique.com

TearDrop Memories Antiques
12 West Mechanic St. 2B
New Hope, PA. 18938
215 862-3401

A Reason to Photograph Things

I’ve just become energized. Energized to be a better photographer. I just met a friend of mine in the supermarket who showed me the iPhone images he made on a recent trip to Guatemala. Basically, they were black and white photos of people during a religious parade (kind of like the Catholic parade of saints held in many Italian-American parishes). Holy shit, I have not seen photographs that riveting in years.

Since I do not have any of my friend's images to use for illustrative purposes, I am sprinkling my own images here from the 2009 Catholic community street Procession of Saints in Philadelphia's Italian Market. The procession is a springtime fundraiser, patterned after the Italian May Day events. People carry or wheel platforms bearing statues of saints through the streets, while onlookers stick dollar bills to the statues' clothing or ribbons. (Also, this gives me a reason to publish these images!)

So back to my friend Eric Mencher’s photography. When he showed me examples on his iPhone, I could not help but compare them to photographs I saw in a “fine art photography” (whatever that means) gallery in New Jersey earlier that same day. There were maybe one or two images in the gallery show that were interesting, but compared to Eric's, they were nothing. (For the record, they were black and white staged and still life photographs, rather than candid street photography like Eric's.)

Just a spring clean for the May Queen

Eric is a veteran newspaper photographer and has worked with all kinds of expensive gear throughout the years, both film and digital. He says he loves the iPhone as a camera because he can shoot spur of the moment, just like when he started out years ago with a Leica rangefinder around his neck. He doesn’t need super high resolution and he likes the lo-fi look that cell phone cameras produce.

Which is not to say that cell phone cameras automatically produce art. Eric is an artist with a unique vision which the iPhone allows him to realize. I may go purchase an iPhone just because of his energizing, emphatic description of this tool that allows him to be so creative. However, I’m sure that I’ll never be able to make such photographs. I could buy an iPhone and visit Guatemala, but still never create images as good as his.

I did invite him to lecture to the Photographic Society of Philadelphia, because I think all photographers become energized when they hear other photographers discuss their creative endeavors. It makes no sense, of course, to run out and try to duplicate someone’s work, but seeing what other creative people can do may energize you in your own work.

If you're a photographer, it helps to have friends who are photographically inclined, supportive, and encouraging. I appreciated Eric's comment as we parted that he has a great deal of respect for photographers who tackle long-term projects such I have with cemetery photography. But then I began to think about it - is my cemetery subject matter just a “project?” Should I be looking to end it and find some other subject matter?

“If you have some reason for doing something  that’s very strong and you start working at it, you must look around every once in a while and find out if the original motives are still right.” At least that’s how scientist Richard Feynman felt about continuing his work in nuclear physics, work that in 1945 helped produce the atomic bomb (ref). Such self-examination as he describes is more easily said than done. I still don't quite understand my draw to cemetery photography, even after doing it for fifteen years. Maybe its just a draw to cemeteries in general, or simply death itself. I don't understand the reason yet, so I guess I'll keep the project going at least until I do. After that, I can re-examine my motives. In the meantime, I’ll just get that iPhone and see what happens ….

Further exploration:
Eric Mencher's website with some examples of his fine photography
The Pleasure of Finding Things Out, by Richard  P. Feynman (Amazon.com)
Italian May Day events

Funerary Music

June 6 marks the anniversary of the founding (in Britain, 1586) of the Guild of Funerary Violinists. How do I know this and why should you care? Well, I know this because I read it in an obscure book I purchased last year called, An Incomplete History of the Art of Funerary Violin (Overlook Press, 2006), by Rohan Kriwaczek. Show of hands - how many of you have read it?

And to the point of why you should care -  funeral music is obviously a major component of the mourning arts, yet not one which is given much consideration. Other than “Taps", Chopin’s Funeral March, or the occasional dirge, can you think of any piece of funerary music?

Contemporary accounts from ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome indicate that musicians were an integral part of funerary processions. The instrument usually played was a flute-like device, to create plaintive melodically-based music to express grief and mortality. Due to its association (by Christians) to pagan ritual, all funerary music (played on instruments) was banned by the Vatican throughout Europe from about the third century A.D. through the next thousand years.

This all changed with the Reformation (sixteenth century) and the arrival of the Violin in England. Led almost singularly by George Babcotte (1542 - 1607), the first of the funerary violinists, the age of the funerary violin flourished for the next 150 years, i.e., until the Great funerary Purges of the 1830s and 1840s.

From the book, An Incomplete History of the Art of Funerary Violin

The great WHAT, you say? Kriwaczek (who happens to be the current Acting President of the [British] Guild of Funerary Violinists) tells us in his book:

“The Great funerary Purges of the 1830s and 1840s [by agents of the Vatican] were to spell the wholesale destruction of this venerable practice and drive the few remaining artists underground, but not before a last grand flourish of creativity had fixed the form of the seven-movement Funerary suite and, within that suite, had defined the morbidly ambiguous and secretly symbolic funeral march once and for all.”

The Vatican in about 1830 began to condemn Funerary Violin as the music of the Devil, slowly wiping out all trace of it throughout Europe. The extent of the purge was devastatingly efficient – almost no trace of the art’s 300-year history (up to the 1830s) exists today.

In consideration of what we have lost, then, this synopsis of Kriwaczek's book (from the Amazon.com website) describes the matter quite well:

Rohan Kriwaczek's book, available Amazon.com

"During the Protestant revolution in Europe, a new kind of music emerged, one that ultimately sought to recognize the deceased and to individuate the sense of loss and grief. But the tradition was virtually wiped out by the Great Funerary Purges of the 1830s and 40s. Kriwaczek tells the fascinating story of this beautiful music, condemned by the Catholic Church for political as much as theological reasons, and of the mysterious Guild of Funerary Violinists that, yes, defends its secrets in our time. This is unquestionably one of the strangest books any publisher has ever risked publishing. Discussing the evolution of European culture, musical forms and society's changing attitudes to mortality and the emotional effects of music upon the soul, this is a dark and magical history."

So the idea of the violin in funerary music has a long and checkered past, from its origin in 1580 to 1915, when it totally died out. Though the work of better known composers of music in the form of the classical funerary march have survived (Chopin, Beethoven, and Mahler), that of the shunned progenitors of funerary violin have not (Hieronymous Gratchenfleiss and Charles Sudbury, for example).

The Theramin

Image from Divine Hand website

Why I bring this all up now is partly because of my neighbor from across the street, Robin. She stopped me outside my house last week and (knowing my penchant for cemeteries), asked if I saw the Internet-advertisement for the musical concert to be held at Philadelphia’s Laurel Hill Cemetery on June 22 (2013). She thought I would find it interesting. So I checked the web and sure enough, a musical ensemble called “The Divine Hand” is playing a concert at Laurel Hill: "Their music can only be described as ethereal, eloquent and mezmerizing.” Instruments consist of the violin, harpsicord, guitar, harp, and theramin. Now, if you’ve never heard a theramin before, you’re in for a weird treat. Invented by Leon Theramin in 1912, this electric instrument is the precursor to electronic synthesizers, such as those made famous by Robert Moog. If there is a creepier sound to be heard in a cemetery, I cannot imagine what it might be.

The theramin is actually played by holding your hand NEAR it (see photo above), kind of like the EBow from the 1970s that was used to make an electric guitar sound like an ethereal violin (you wouldn't actually touch the strings with the device). What does a theramin sound like?  Playing the saw, is the best I can come up with. Or that weird sound throughout the Beach Boys' song Good Vibrations. But give this video a play - it shows Russian inventor Leon Theramin himself coaxing eerie sounds out of this marvelous instrument (which he patented in 1928).

I think you’ll agree that a night concert of funerary music in a cemetery might be quite riveting, if not downright frightening. Add to that a master practitioner of the theramin, and you have a truly unique experience, not to mention a history lesson in a widely-neglected aspect of the funerary arts.

The Divine Hand Ensemble

Leon Theramin with his invention (ref)

Laurel Hill’s website describes a previous concert played in the cemetery (fall, 2012) by The Divine Hand Ensemble as the “musical event of a lifetime. Their performance comprised the first time in 250 years that a program of funerary music was performed publicly and the first time ever in America.” It goes on: “Witness Mano Divina, leader of the Ensemble, harness electricity with his fingertips and draw music out of the air as master of the Theremin, an early electronic musical instrument controlled without discernible physical contact from the player. In addition to this rare instrument, the Ensemble includes a string quartet, classical guitar, two harps, a glockenspiel, a soprano and a tenor, together rendering an unforgettable listening experience.”

The Divine Hand has its own website, which is truly entertaining in its own right. You can watch video clips of performances and hear the wonderful music. Some quotes from their site:

“Breathless entertainment that leaves you hanging on every note and gesture as Divina hypnotizes electricity to release the voices of angels from the air with this finger tips” -www.allaboutjazz.com

"Classical music does not change very often, but we're always in for a shock when it does. The Divine Hand Ensemble has done exactly this through the works of Mano Divina and a few radical Americans. The extremely talented group from Philadelphia, The Divine Hand Ensemble, consists of a Thereminist, string quartet, classical guitarist, two harpists, a soprano, and a tenor. These musicians give a flawless performance; their fine musicianship and incredible talent is ever apparent throughout the entire concert. For music lovers of all ages, The Divine Hand Ensemble is a must see experience that will leave a remarkable impression for a lifetime." - International review board

I conclude this article on funerary music with this interesting accolade, directed to the Divine Hand Ensemble:
"Congratulations to your fine violinist, for a sensitive and expressive portrayal of our fine Art"
-The Guild of Funerary Violinists

References and Further Reading:

A General Introduction to the Art and History of Funerary Violin
The Divine Hand Ensemble website
What's a Theramin?
You Tube video of Leon Theramin playing the instrument he invented
Read on Laurel Hill Cemetery's website, "MUSIC for the HEARING EYE: CONCERT ATOP the CRYPTS presented by THE DIVINE HAND ENSEMBLE."

Forgotten on Memorial Day

On this Memorial Day, I cannot help but think about the trademarked slogan of the Wounded Warrior Project (see link at end), “The greatest casualty is being forgotten,” and how the phrase is so descriptive of Graceland Cemetery.

Entrance to Graceland Cemetery, Yeadon, Pennsylvania

Graceland, that full city block-sized, um, field in Yeadon, Pennsylvania supposedly has thousands of United States veterans of many wars buried beneath its grass. The place looks like one of those memorial parks with the flush-to-the-ground grave markers – except there very few grave markers of any kind. On this Memorial Day in 2013, the bare flag poles behind the entrance sign stare at you in mute witness to what had been and what might have been. Honestly, if it were not for the oddly striking white marble monuments scattered here and there across the field, you would think it was just a park.

There’s a community athletic field alongside Graceland Cemetery, and housing on the other two sides. An industrial company sits near the entrance to the grounds, at Ruskin Lane and Bailey Road (Map). The cemetery is off the beaten path, a few blocks from the center of town. Yeadon, by the way, is a small town in Delaware County, which borders Philadelphia on Philly’s southwest side. I used to live nearby, and I never knew the cemetery was there.

Graceland, which was established in 1774, has been referred to as North Mount Moriah Cemetery since around 1895. This was due mainly to its geographic proximity to the much larger Mount Moriah Cemetery (established in 1855), which is about a half mile away. Graceland was not, and is not part of Mount Moriah Cemetery. It has, however, been known by other names, e.g. Buren Hill Cemetery and Sylvan Memorial Park.

Civil War headstone lying in Graceland Cemetery

The sign at the entrance to “Graceland Memorial Burial Ground” (as it is called on the Delaware County History website) says that 1600 Civil War veterans are buried here. So why no fanfare? Why the bare flagpoles? Did they move the bodies as some websites indicate? My question is this: if all the bodies were removed, why is it still called a ‘cemetery” on the sign?

Some burial records exist, but not all. As the entrance sign indicates, Graceland is home to an “unknown number of civilian burials.” On the Delaware County History website, a few hundred names are listed. Among them, eleven veterans. If the records exist, the federal government can be petitioned to have new grave markers made to be placed on these veterans’ graves. If worn stones exist, they will be replaced for free. Why the town of Yeadon has not requisitioned the federal government for new stones for the veterans’ graves is beyond me. According to these records, the locations of eleven veterans’ graves are known, based on a 1936 survey of the remaining headstones. 

This 1938 account of the burial situation indicates that the body count of veteran “soldiers” is closer to 5600. It goes on to state “Many of the old stones have been damaged and carried away and broken by the boys who frequent the cemetery as a play-field. Others have been used to form a wall at the rear of the cemetery. I should judge about fifty of the old fashioned marble, three inches thick type, made up the wall.” According to court documents, the Borough of Yeadon condemned the cemetery in 1964 because it was a “public nuisance.” It was closed to future burials and most of the head stones were removed. I assume the handful of large marble and granite monuments still on the grounds were left there simply because they were too large to move.

One of a handful of lone monuments left in Graceland Cemetery

I cannot help but wonder if one of the reasons for building the athletic field - Kerr Field - next door (a basketball game was in progress during my visit), was to discourage continued use of the graveyard as a playing field. At least the sacredness of the ground has is being observed – there appears to be no ball-playing of any kind in Graceland. Even though there are no gates or fencing, the locals obviously avoid walking through the cemetery to reach the basketball courts. There are also no paths worn in the grass. Signs warn of a $300 fine for dumping.

On my first journey out to this place where the journey of so many others ended, I instinctively began walking toward the distant corner of the cemetery field, toward a lone eight-foot marble obelisk. Too preoccupied with the surrounding rowhomes (and their quaint graffiti), I hadn’t noticed the stubs of white marble sticking out of the grass here, there, everywhere. You can see that the grounds were at one time densely populated with headstones and other grave markers. White marble nubs, headstone bases, and an occasional section marker are scattered all over the field, flush with the ground. The stones that stick up more than an inch have been clipped and worn by the blades of riding mowers. The grass is cut routinely here, I assume by the town. At least this form of respect continues to be afforded the dead.  

Graceland is supposedly the home of reinterred bodies from various condemned cemeteries in Philadelphia (Macpelah in South Philly and Hanover Cemetery in Kensington, to name two). By 1938, Graceland still had an owner, but the property was not taken care of. Headstones were stolen and smashed. “By the time Yeadon took over the care of the cemetery, many of the stones had already been stolen or broken throughout years of neglect and were piled to the side or were decorating neighborhood gardens.”

Lone monument on the edge of Graceland Cemetery

According to this Ancestry.com reference, the town of Yeadon cleared the derelict cemetery in the 1960, dumped all the headstones somewhere, and [maybe] moved the bodies to Rockledge. Lawnview Cemetery in the Rockledge section of northeast Philadelphia had reportedly been the recipient of various cemetery reinterments, with mass graves being the burial method of choice. So much for a "blissful immortality." 

Whether there are 5600 veterans buried at Graceland, or even 1600, or just eleven, can we at least mark the eleven known graves of our war veterans? Flush-to-the-ground memorial plaques would not impede the grass-cutting. 

Naval Plot, Mount Moriah Cemetery, Philadelphia

So on this Memorial Day, 2013 – one hundred and fifty years after the Battle of Gettysburg – the lives of so many veterans have been forgotten. These were not unknown soldiers – the grave markers were originally there – we just, as a people, allowed them and their memory to be destroyed. Ironic that the original purpose of Memorial Day was to commemorate the lives of Union and Confederate soldiers who died in the American Civil War. It was originally known as Decoration Day, a day on which veterans’ graves would be decorated with flowers. The veterans’ graves in this particular cemetery will not be decorated as long as the locations of the graves remain unmarked. This disrespect to the veterans rests with us as the nation that created this memorial cemetery in the first place.

References and Acknowledgements:
Wounded Warrior Project
Thanks to Robert Hobdell for historical information.

Homeless in the Cemetery

Well, this was one of the weirdest cemetery experiences I have had. I was photographing Mikveh Israel Cemetery in west Philadelphia (55th and Market Streets) through the fence the other day and this guy came up to me saying his name was Marco Polo. He kept telling my friend John and I that he walks past this cemetery every day on his way to work and that we should call Channel 29 television about the deplorable conditions in the cemetery. Other than some uncut grass, it really didn’t look that bad.

Mikveh Israel Cemetery, 55th and Market Streets, Philadelphia

John (L) and "Marco Polo"

So after taking a few photos of some monuments and headstones, Marco Polo finally told us why he likes this cemetery so much. “I slept in here when I was homeless - by that red bush over there.” We didn’t ask how long he camped out in the cemetery, but we all agreed that he was safer inside than he would have been outside. He seemed to have a genuine fondness for the cemetery and would not stop talking about how it should be "fixed up."

Market Street wall and gated entrance to Mikveh Israel Cemetery

If you know Philadelphia, you know that 55th and Market is right under the elevated train tracks that follow Market Street. And you might also guess this is inner city at its best (or worst, depending on your point of view). As in most major cities, this is where you find the cemeteries with the most character. Congregation Mikveh Israel keeps the grass cut and the fencing in place, which is about all that is needed to keep troublemakers out. 

Building near 55th and Market Streets, Philadelphia

The original Mikveh Israel Cemetery (the first Jewish cemetery in Philadelphia, established in 1740) is located at Eighth and Spruce Streets in Philadelphia, near Pennsylvania Hospital (the nation’s first hospital, established in  1751 by Benjamin Franklin). Two additional plots of ground were added by Congregation Mikveh Israel – a second one at 11th and Federal Streets and a third one, which is the subject of this blog, at 55th and Market Streets. While I can find no information on the years in which the second and third cemeteries were established, the 55th and Market Street cemetery has headstones marked from as early as 1868 to as recent as 2008. This cemetery is actually labeled “inactive” on the website of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Greater Philadelphia (JGSGP). 

The tall marble obelisk you see in the photo above marks the grave of Rev. Isaac Leeser (1806 - 1868), "the most famous leader and spokesman of traditional Judaism in Antebellum America" (ref). He was a minister in Congregation Mikveh Israel, as well as founder and publisher of The Occident, a monthly anti-discriminatory periodical "devoted to the diffusion of knowledge on Jewish literature and religion." He translated the Hebrew bible into English in 1853.

 If you’d like to visit any of these three Jewish cemeteries, please note that you cannot actually get inside any of them without either A) having someone from Congregation Mikveh Israel unlock the gates (good luck with that); or B) climbing over the fence or wall (which I would not recommend). All three cemeteries are quite secure, though not actually guarded. All are well-maintained.

Further Reading and References:

Find-a-Grave link to each of the three Philadelphia Mikveh Israel cemeteries in Philadelphia

History of Philadelphia’s Congregation Mikveh Israel Cemetery