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East Oregonian
EAT, DRINK & EXPLORE
Saturday, May 25, 2019
AP Photo/Jacqueline Larma
Celina Gray, right, and her daughter Kalliope Kourelis trim a rose bush growing on the cradle grave of Mary Glenn, at the Woodlands Cemetery in Philadelphia. The cem-
eteries of yore existed as much for the living as for the dead. And a handful of these 19th century graveyards are restoring the bygone tradition of cemetery gardening.
GRAVE GARDENERS
Volunteers help spiff up old cemeteries
By TRACEE M.
HERBAUGH
Associated Press
T
he cemeteries of yore
existed as much for the
living as for the dead.
People would picnic and relax
there as they would in a park
today.
Now, a handful of 19th cen-
tury graveyards are restoring
the bygone tradition of ceme-
tery gardening, enlisting volun-
teers to help keep things green
and tidy.
Amy Lambert, for instance,
volunteers at The Woodlands,
a cemetery near her apartment
in Philadelphia. She had been
looking for a way to garden
after she moved out of an Aus-
tin, Texas, house with a lush
backyard.
“This was an opportunity to
get my hands dirty,” said Lam-
bert, a 52-year-old architect.
She’s one of about 150
“Grave Gardeners” tending
cradle graves at The Wood-
lands, a 54-acre cemetery
where 30,000 people are bur-
ied. Cradle graves, stylish in the
19th century, have an upright
stone where the name is etched,
and an attached oblong planter
that resembles a bathtub. It was
common for relatives to plant
and tend gardens in them.
Graveyards of that era,
known as “garden” or “rural”
cemeteries, were built on roll-
ing hills outside of cities.
“They were inviting places,”
said Leslie Wilson, a his-
tory professor at Montclair
State University in New Jer-
sey. “They were the precursor
to these huge public parks we
have today, like Central Park.”
Some cemeteries have infor-
mal gardening programs, while
others require volunteers to
submit applications. Staff hor-
ticulturalists often oversee the
work.
The Victorian-era Oakland
Cemetery in Atlanta relies on
volunteer gardeners. There are
at least 40 regulars who prune,
weed, plant and manicure.
They are supplemented by hun-
dreds of occasional volunteers,
often from corporations and
schools. And Oakland solicits
the public for one-day projects
about six times a year.
Its volunteer program has
been around for decades and
has grown substantially in the
past 10 years or so, says Sara
Henderson, Oakland’s director
of gardens.
ABOVE: Jessica Baumert, left, executive director of The Woodlands, speaks with volunteer Joe Shap-
iro, in front of the former stable at The Woodlands in Philadelphia. BELOW: Gardened cradle graves
are seen at the Woodlands Cemetery in Philadelphia.
“The core group, they’re stones that make mowing easier. ervationist. She got the idea for
“You might go to a contem- The Woodlands Grave Garden-
very passionate about what they
do and give countless hours to porary cemetery on Memorial ers after reading about the 19th
Day but there’s no other rea- century custom of decorating
us,” she said.
cradle graves.
Ameri-
can attitudes
The Wood-
lands was the
toward death
country estate
and
ceme-
teries
have
of
William
changed since
Hamilton, a
the 19th cen-
prominent
tury. Today,
horticultural-
ist. It became
Jessica Baumert, executive director of The Woodlands and a historic preservationist
cemeteries are
the final rest-
built with one
ing
place
thing in mind:
burying dead people. Newer son to go,” said Jessica Bau- for many politicians, wealthy
graveyards are built to house mert, executive director of The businessmen, Civil War offi-
many rows of graves and flat Woodlands and a historic pres- cers and Joseph A. Campbell, a
“WE’RE TRYING TO ENCOURAGE PEOPLE
TO USE THE CEMETERY IN THE WAY
IT WAS DESIGNED TO BE USED.”
founder of the Campbell Soup
Company.
The grounds are also a vital
part of the West Philadelphia
neighborhood, and are popular
with runners, dog walkers and
picnickers.
“We’re trying to encourage
people to use the cemetery in
the way it was designed to be
used,” Baumert explained.
The Woodlands’ Grave Gar-
deners program is in its fourth
year, and every season it grows.
The cemetery had to cap the
number of volunteers at 150.
Some volunteers are paired
up, and most look after a single
grave. More experienced gar-
deners take on two or three.
“We’ve become good friends
and really enjoyed working
on this together,” said Mau-
reen Cook, 68, of her garden-
ing partner Greta Greenberger,
72. The pair, who did not know
each other before, planted deep
purple and burgundy flowers
in the cradle grave of Andrew
Craig, a wine importer.
There’s an approved list
of plants from which garden-
ers can choose. The selection
reflects the horticultural his-
tory of the site and the tastes
of the Victorian era. Approved
plants include snapdragons,
hollyhock, iris, bear’s breeches
and love-lies-bleeding, a vel-
vety-looking plant that was
prized in Victorian gardens.
Lambert was assigned the
Haseltine family plot, where
three of seven members have
cradle graves, and has enjoyed
researching the family’s past.
She found an obituary for
Charles Haseltine (1840-1915)
that called the art dealer an
“irrepressible lover of puns.”
Some Haseltine descen-
dants still visit the family plot
every November to decorate
the graves with red bows, she
says.
Another Grave Gardener,
Sherry Michael, a 47-year-old
computer security analyst at
the University of Pennsylva-
nia, cared for the Evans family
plot with fellow volunteer Ali-
son Williams, 54. They worked
together for two years, until
Williams died of cancer this
year. In her memory, the Grave
Gardeners planted a rose bush
on the Evans plot.
“Working at a cemetery
gives you lots of thoughts,”
Michael said. “Your day-to-
day issues don’t seem as big
because you’re reminded life is
so fleeting.”