The Dearly Departed Players

2013 Performance of The Dearly Departed Players

This coming Sunday, October 12, 2014, the Cemetery Traveler will be traveling to Scranton, Pennsylvania (from Philadelphia, where I live) to attend the annual “Dunmore Cemetery Tour.” This is actually in Dunmore, PA, a suburb of Scranton. And it’s really not so much a tour, as it is a a tour-d-force performance by the Dearly Departed Players, a theatrical troupe headed by Julie Snell-Esty.

Julie Esty (r) with daughter Megan during a performance

"Dearly Departed" cast member

The free tour is held on two weekends every October. This year, it was held on Sunday, October 5; next weekend, it will be held on Sunday, October 12. To give you an idea of the size of this event, about 400 people showed up last Sunday! This is typical. The Dearly Departed Players are a cast of about fifteen amateur and professional theatrical performers who enact scenes at different spots in the cemetery. The crowd is led to each of maybe eight sites where it stops to witness a (audio amplified) short play, monologue, reenactments, ballet, or a Spoon River Anthology-type presentation.

Wendy Conrad Belaski performing at Dunmore Cemetery

The crowd enjoys a witty and historically accurate script written (a new one each year!) by the troupe's artistic director Julie Esty. Some of the stories of those interred here in the Dunmore Cemetery have been published in Julie’s two books, listed below. As with her books, Julie bestows upon the audience an abundance of humor, tears, and history, all the while raising the public's awareness to the importance of cemeteries. The enthusiastic cast of Dearly Departed Players brings her script to life - so to speak.

Books by Julie Snell-Esty
Stories in Stone: Tales of Life from the Dunmore Cemetery
Stories in Stone Volume II: Tales of Life from the Dunmore and Forest Hill Cemeteries
(Please contact Julie Esty directly to purchase.)
      

This will be the third year I have attended the tour, officially as a guest artist, but I do tag around after the crowd to enjoy some of the entertainment. I set up on the lawn near the entrance about an hour before the crowd arrives (noon), along with a few other artist/vendors. So basically, I create a freestanding exhibit of my photographs, greeting cards, jewelry, books, etc. on a table and display racks on the lawn at the cemetery entrance. Then, busloads of people show up. It is in this short interval of time that I try to make my sales! I do spend quite a bit of time, however, chatting with folks about cemeteries in general. The tour begins at 2 pm.

Ed Snyder's "Stone Angels" sales display at the Dunmore Cemetery

Ballet during 2012 Dunmore Cemetery Tour

It is fascinating to see how many people show up for the performance, attesting to the quality of the production and the dedication of the Dearly Departed Players! You may notice from my photos that the performers typically dress in period costume, with the Victorian era being a quite popular one.

Performer entertaining an audience of hundreds at Dunmore Cemetery

After the two-hour tour/performance, the main thing on the minds of those hundreds of people is a bathroom! So while the cemetery for the most part clears out quickly, I tend to chat with many hangers-on, whether they be genealogists, actors, historians, or just regular people sharing ghost stories! There has traditionally been a dinner afterword and I am grateful for the invitations I have been extended by the Dearly Departed Players. They are such a joy to spend time with!

2013 cast of the Dearly Departed Players at the Dunmore Cemetery

More information!

Voices from the past tell their stories as tour windsthrough an autumn hued Dunmore Cemetery

First Friday: Julie Esty and the Dearly Departed Players

Around the Towns, Sept. 28, 2014
The Dearly Departed Players on Facebook
The Dunmore Cemetery Tour on Facebook

Dearly Departing for the Dunmore Cemetery

I’m quite looking forward to October 7, 2012, when I’ll be attending the Dunmore Cemetery Tour, in Dunmore, Pennsylvania, hosted and presented by the Dearly Departed Players theatrical group. Thousands of people attended this annual event over a two-weekend period in the fall of 2011!

From the Dunmore Cemetery Tour Facebook page:

    Sunday, October 7  and 14, 2012

    2:00pm until 4:00pm

    Dunmore Cemetery,  400 Church Street,  Dunmore, PA 18512

    Join the Dearly Departed Players on their annual historical walking tour through the Dunmore Cemetery. With all new "stops" the "Players" will be joined by the students of Scranton Civic Ballet and the Genealogical Research Society.    No reservations are required, admission is free. For more information regarding the tour call 570-344-3819.

    Don't forget "Dinner with The Dearly Departed"on October 7th. This dinner is sponsored by the Dunmore Historical Society and will take place immediately following the tour at the Dunmore Civic Center on Monroe Avenue. Reservations are required, tickets are $8 and can be obtained by calling the Dunmore Historical Society at 558-1060. All proceeds from the dinner benefit the Dunmore Historical Society.

Dunmore Cemetery, Dunmore, Pennsylvania

From what I’ve read and heard, the performers, sponsors, and coordinators do an incredible job with this program so I’m just DYING to see it! I was graciously invited by the coordinators to exhibit my artwork in the cemetery the first day of the tour (October 7), so I will be set up at the entrance at noon. I do hope to take in some of the tour, however!

For the occasion, I made cards and prints from images in the Dunmore Cemetery itself, and will exhibit these along with my cemetery photography from all over the United States (and Italy as well). I spent a few hours in the Dunmore Cemetery last fall and photographed many of the wonderful monuments, mausoleums, and headstones. I used about twenty of these photographs for the new work, examples of which you see in this article.

The Dunmore Cemetery is a wonderful Victorian masterpiece, meticulously cared for and interesting in so many ways. From the iron scrollwork on the mausoleum doors to the unusual monuments,  to the rolling hills that lead you back to the old section (1838) of the cemetery, there is something here for everyone − taphophiles, historians, nature-lovers, and those who just want a quiet place to think.

Headstones in the old section of the cemetery

Click to buy Julie Snell-Esty's book

No doubt some of the trees up there in northeast Pennsylvania will soon be donning their fall attire. Such will add to the pageantry of the Dearly Departed Players, as they (in Victorian dress) lead the audience through a two-hour tour of the lives of some of the cemetery’s residents, re-enacting interesting events in their lives. These “Stories in Stone,” as Players’ director Julie Snell-Esty calls them in her book of the same name, provide the script through which her cast fleshes out the lives of people who lived in the region.

Today, people “yearn to learn of their past” and to preserve their heritage, Esty says. The region’s ancestors include miners, soldiers, housewives, clerks, laborers, merchants, and artists – who “all played a significant role in the making of our history.” These people are no different than those of your own ancestors, wherever you live. While you might not recognize any of the personages addressed in the tour as celebrities or national heroes, they give one a sense of how everyone contributes in their own way to the “fabric of our history.” So even if you cannot attend either of the October 7 and 14 cemetery performances, I hope I’ve stirred up enough interest in you to at least visit the Dunmore Cemetery.

As a side note, Dearly Departed Players Julie Snell-Esty and Wendy Belaski’s “Grave Matters Funeral Exhibit” affords us a look at the history of mourning in the United States:

Grave Matters Funeral Exhibit 
    Saturday, October 27, 2012

    10:00am until 5:00pm

Mall at Steamtown, Second Floor, Scranton, Pennsylvania 18503

                Local historians and Dearly Departed Palyers Wendy Belaski and Julie Snell-Esty bring their curious collection of funeral and mourning memorabilia to Library Express! Players will be on hand and in historic costume to help explain photos and histories of mausoleum stained glass, vintage funeral fashion, and a whole collection of ephemera related to funerals and cemeteries. This is not to be missed! Schedule, 2-4 pm, dinner afterwards.

References:

The Dunmore Cemetery Tour on Facebook

Scranton PA chamber of Commerce link to the Dunmore CemeteryTour

Stories in Stone: Tales Of Life from the Dunmore Cemetery by Julie Snell-Esty