Green-Wood Cemetery Totally Explained

Everything about Green-wood Cemetery totally explained

Green-Wood Cemetery was founded in 1838 as a rural cemetery in Kings County, New York, now in Brooklyn. It was granted National Historic Landmark status in 2006 by the U.S. Department of the Interior.
   Located in Greenwood Heights, Brooklyn, it lies several blocks west of Prospect Park, between Park Slope, Windsor Terrace and Sunset Park. In The New York Times, it was said that "it is the ambition of the New Yorker to live upon the Fifth Avenue, to take his airings in the Park, and to sleep with his fathers in Green-Wood". Inspired by Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where a cemetery in a naturalistic park-like landscape in the English manner was first established, Green-Wood was able to take advantage of the varied topography provided by glacial moraines. Battle Hill, the highest point in Brooklyn, is on cemetery grounds.
   The cemetery was the idea of Henry Evelyn Pierrepoint, a Brooklyn social leader. It was a popular tourist attraction in the 1850s and was the place most famous New Yorkers who died during the second half of the nineteenth century were buried. It is still an operating cemetery with approximately 600,000 graves spread out over 478 acres (1.9 km²). The rolling hills and dales, several ponds and an on-site chapel provide an environment that still draws visitors. On weekends cars are allowed on cemetery grounds. There are several famous monuments located there, including a statue of DeWitt Clinton and a Civil War Memorial. During the Civil War, Green-Wood Cemetery created the "Soldiers' Lot" for free veterans' burials. Richard Upjohn designed an entrance gate on 5th Avenue opposite 25th Street (1861) in the Gothic Revival style, along with several wooden shelters (including one in a Gothic Revival style, one resembling an Italian villa, and another resembling a Swiss chalet). A descendent colony of monk parakeets that escaped their containers on a flight from South America to Idlewild International Airport (today JFK) in the 1960s today nests in the center spire of the gate.

The cemetery was declared a National Historic Landmark in 2006.

Notable burials

Samuel Akerly (1785-1845), founder of the New York Institute for the Blind
Albert Anastasia (1903-1957), mobster, "Lord High Executioner" for "Murder Inc."
Othniel Boaz Askew (1972-2003), politician and assassin of James E. Davis (cremated)
Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988), artist
William Holbrook Beard (1824-1900), painter of Bulls and Bears representing the market cycle; a bear statue sits on top of his headstone
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887), abolitionist
James Gordon Bennett, Sr. (1795-1872), founder/publisher of the New York Herald
Henry Bergh (1818-1888), founder of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990), composer, conductor
Samuel Blatchford (1820-1893), U.S. Supreme Court Justice
Alice Cary (1820-1871), poet, author
Phoebe Cary (1824-1871), poet, author
Henry Chadwick (1824-1908), Baseball Hall of Fame member (memorial)
DeWitt Clinton (1769-1828), unsuccessful U.S. presidential candidate 1812; U.S. Senator from New York; seventh and ninth Governor of New York
Peter Cooper (1791-1883), inventor, manufacturer, abolitionist, founder of Cooper Union
James Creighton, Jr. (1841-1862), baseball player
Lola Montez (1821-1861), actress and mistress of many notable men
Samuel F.B. Morse (1791-1872), invented Morse code, language of the telegraph
James Kirke Paulding (1779-1860), U.S. Secretary of the Navy under Martin Van Buren; thought to be "author" of "Peter picked a peck of pickled peppers", although it had already been published in children's primers in Britain as early as 1813.
Anson Greene Phelps, (1781-1853) founder of Phelps, Dodge mining and copper company.

William "Bill The Butcher" Poole (1821-1855), a member of the Bowery Boys gang and the Know Nothing political party; also a bare-knuckle boxer.

Samuel C. Reid (1783-1861), suggested the design upon which all U.S. flags since 1818 have been based

Alice Roosevelt (1861-1884) - first wife of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt

Martha Bulloch Roosevelt (1834-1884), mother of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt

Robert Roosevelt (1829-1906), uncle of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt

Theodore Roosevelt, Sr. (1831-1878), father of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt

Margaret Sanger (1879-1966), birth control advocate

Ira Sankey (1840-1908), hymn composer

Frederick August Otto Schwarz (1836-1911), founder of specialty toy retailer FAO Schwarz

Henry Warner Slocum (1827-1894), Union General of the American Civil War, U.S. House Representative from N.Y.

Francis Barretto Spinola (1821–1891), first Italian-American elected to the U.S. House of Representatives

Henry Steinway (1797-1871), founder of Steinway & Sons, piano manufacturers

William Steinway (1836-1896), son of Henry Steinway, and founder of Steinway, New York

James S. T. Stranahan (1808-1898), "Father of Prospect Park", was an instrumental promoter of the park, the Brooklyn Bridge, and the consolidation of Brooklyn into Greater New York

Francis Scott Street (1831-1883), co-owner of Street & Smith publishers

John Thomas (1805-1871), founding father of The Christadelphians

Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848-1933), artist

Matilda (or Mathilda) Tone, widow of Irish rebel Wolfe Tone

Juan Trippe (1899-1981), airline pioneer, headed Pan Am from 1927 to 1968

Robert Troup (1756-1832), Revolutionary War hero, New York State assemblyman and Judge. Body moved to Green-Wood in 1872.

William Marcy "Boss" Tweed (1823-1878), notorious New York political boss, member of the U.S. House of Representatives and New York State Senate

Leopold von Gilsa (d. 1870), Civil war colonel

Thomas R. Whitney (1807-1858), member of the U.S. House of Representatives from New York

Frank Morgan Wupperman (1890-1949), played the character of the Wizard in The Wizard of Oz.Further Information

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