Visiting Chicago Cemeteries

Three of Chicago’s oldest cemeteries are lessons in history, and also, surprisingly, in life.

“There’s a lot of money here -- and a lot of love,” Street- Wise Vendor A. Allen said when he visited Rosehill on the northwest side for the first time. “Most people just have their hand out when you die nowadays, but these people actually mourned their loved ones.” (Please see related story, page 13.)

StreetWise Vendors Lee A. Holmes and Paula Green, meanwhile, pondered how the largest concentration of Confederate soldiers outside the South – people who fought against freedom for slaves – could rest peacefully at Oak Woods Cemetery on the South Side, close to Civil Rights icons such as Ida B. Wells Barnett, the Staples Singers and Mayor Harold Washington. (Please see related story, page 11.)

Rosehill, Oak Woods, and Graceland in Lakeview are all “garden,” or “rural,” cemeteries dating from roughly the same period in the mid-19th century. Chicago’s City Cemetery, just outside what was then the city limits at North Avenue and the lakefront, was jumbled and crowded -- but more than that, a threat to the drinking water supply, civic leaders realized. The last burials at the City Cemetery were in 1866. Disinterments began after Rosehill opened in 1859, followed by the development of Lincoln Park, according to the Hidden Truths website.

One of the oldest graves in Graceland Cemetery belongs to John Kinzie.

Photo by Suzanne Hanney

The English architect Sir Christopher Wren had advocated enclosed burial grounds on the outskirts of towns “decently planted and with yew trees,” as early as 1711, according to Graceland Cemetery material by Jake Coolidge and Joe Collier. Garden cemeteries took hold in the United States as civic institutions rather than religious ones; they became like parks, with statuary commissioned by wealthy families. After Graceland was established in 1861, visitors took the train from North Water Street to spend the day there. Roundtrip fare was 10 cents.

Graceland’s wide roads and open spaces still attract inline skaters, hikers and bicyclists. The Morton Arboretum has certified its collection of 2000 trees as an arboretum and trustees manage removal and planting, with an emphasis on adding color. Besides Japanese Yew, you’ll find 100 varieties, from the Cockspur Hawthorn native to Chicago, to European birch and beech, Norway spruce, Manchurian and Chinese Lilac, and various dogwood, cedar, oak, spirea, viburnum and elm trees.

Potter Palmer's family monument

Photo by Suzanne Hanney

Located at Irving Park Road and Clark Street, Graceland’s 120 acres extend north to Montrose Avenue and east to the CTA Red Line. A visit there connects the dots of Chicago family trees, almost as if you were visiting their homes.

“The difference is that Graceland is older money and Rosehill is second wave,” said Al Walavich, a cemetery historian for over 30 years and a founder of the Uptown Historical Society. “Graceland has Marshall Field and the people you would associate with early Chicago and bringing the 1893 World’s Fair to Chicago. With Rosehill, it’s a somewhat later contingent.” Oak Woods, meanwhile, has a reputation as a major Black cemetery, although it was originally segregated.

John Kinzie and Dexter Graves are some of the oldest settlers at Graceland. Kinzie was the third owner of Jean Baptiste Pointe du Sable’s home on the Chicago River, at what is now the Apple Store on Michigan Avenue. The city’s first permanent nonindigenous resident, Kinzie was born in 1763, died in 1828, and was buried at the Fort Dearborn cemetery, the City Cemetery, and then Graceland. Kinzie Street is named for him.

The Schoenhofens' Egyptian-inspired tomb.

Photo by Suzanne Hanney

Graves, born in 1793, came to Chicago in 1831 with a contingent from Ohio. A hotel owner, he was listed among 500 Chicagoans on the census prior to incorporation. He died in 1845 and in 1909, his son commissioned Loredo Taft to create “Eternal Silence,” an 8-foot bronze sculpture set against black granite (pictured on the cover).

Predictably, the status section of Graceland centers on its Lake Willowmere. Daniel Burnham, architect of the World’s Fair and the 1909 Plan of Chicago, is on an island in the middle of the lake. The Potter Palmers have a Grecian temple on its west side, with her parents, the Honores, a French Gothic tomb across the road. A little farther down is the William Goodman family, namesake of the Goodman Theatre; and at the intersection of Lake and Main Avenues, the William Kimballs, Martin Ryersons Sr., George Pullmans and Peter Schoenhofens.

The tomb of William Kimball and his wife in a similar Grecian style

Photo by Suzanne Hanney

“It’s all about location, location, location; you’re by the lake, you have the water feature,” Walavich said.

“You lived large and you died large. You’re keeping up with the other families. You’re showing your status with the monuments, especially the section around the lake. The area around the lake developed in the 1880s and 1890s; the names we know are from that era and they’re all competing with each other.”

Potter Palmer (1826-1902) built the Palmer House hotel, helped layout Lake Shore Drive, incorporate the Board of Trade and plan the World’s Fair. His wife, Bertha, headed the Fair’s Board of Lady Managers, developed a large collection of French Impressionist paintings later acquired by the Art Institute of Chicago – and doubled the $8 million she inherited upon Potter’s death.

Daniel Burnham's tombstone

Photo by Suzanne Hanney

Bertha hired the firm of McKim, Mead & White of New York City to design the family monument. The widowed Mrs. Kimball hired the same firm to design a mourning angel surrounded by Grecian columns.

Ryerson Sr.’s (1818-1887) and Schoenhofen’s tombs incorporate Egyptian motifs, which went in and out of fashion since Napoleon in the early 1800s, Walavich said.

“Who did the best job of burying their dead?” he said of the Egyptian style’s popularity.

Ryerson had made his money in lumber and then real estate, and his son Martin A. (1856-1932) followed him in lumber after several years of practicing law. He was also a founder of the Field Museum and University of Chicago and a trustee of the Art Institute. For their tomb, Louis H. Sullivan combined a pyramid with a rectangular mastaba in stark black granite. Sullivan (1856-1924) himself died penniless but the architectural community contributed to a headstone featuring his profile and customary scrollwork, located just behind the Kimballs.

Schoenhofen, (1827-1893) whose brewery building on 18th Street is on the National Register of Historic Places, appeared to hedge his bet spiritually. His pyramid tomb features an austere-faced sphinx -- and a very Victorian mourning angel.

Pullman (1831-1897) was known for his railroad sleeping car factory and the 1894 strike in which he refused to negotiate with the union. He died three years after that strike and there was still enough bitterness that his tomb was built of reinforced concrete so that it could not be vandalized. A Corinthian column stands on top. Adjoining plots are of the Lowdens and the Millers, his daughter’s and granddaughter’s respective families. Frank Lowden was governor of Illinois from 1917 to 1921.

Around the corner, on still-pricey real estate on the other side of the lake, is Ernie Banks (1931-2015), first baseman and shortstop for the Chicago Cubs from 1953 to 1971. A Hall of Famer in his first year of eligibility, he was two-time National League MVP, and hit 519 home runs in his career with the Cubs.

A fielder’s mitt and ball atop his tombstone are sometimes joined by a real ball from visitors. Fans also leave notes at the tombstone.

Ernie Banks's tombstone at Graceland Cemetery

Photo by Suzanne Hanney

A statue of Inez Clarke, who died just before her 7th birthday in 1880, receives similar attention, with pennies from visitors pressed up against the glass enclosure atop her tomb. A legend about her is that she died after being struck by lightning, which leads to the ghost story that the statue disappears during thunderstorms because of her fear.

At Rosehill, a similar statue of Lulu Fellows, who died at 16 in 1883 of typhoid fever, receives dollar bills, makeup, toys – even a rock ‘n roll Barbie doll. Other effigies in a glass case are those of Frances Pearce and her baby, to which A. Allen referred. Pearce came to Chicago at 17 and died two years later, in 1854, of tuberculosis. Her baby died two months afterward. The statue was carved in Rome in 1856 and the tomb moved from the City Cemetery to Rosehill. The largest cemetery in Chicago, at 350 acres, it was located in 1859 at 5800 N. Ravenswood Ave.

The tombstone of Lulu Fellows, with gifts from visitors, at Rosehill Cemetery

Photo by Suzanne Hanney

The Victorians would have received comfort from these statues because they believed in memorializing their loved ones, celebrating what they worked for all their lives and visiting them, Walavich said.

George Bangs, for example, designed the railway car that enabled mail to go from Chicago to New York in 24 hours, but he died in his early 50s. His tombstone depicts a railway car going into a tunnel and a tree chopped down in its prime – encircled with ivy that symbolizes the eternal soul.

The elaborate tribute to George Banks at Rosehill Cemetery.

Photo by Suzanne Hanney

Similarly, Frances Willard led the 19th century temperance movement because she believed alcohol contributed to both poverty and domestic violence; she was also active in the women’s suffrage movement. Her tombstone bears the simple epitaph: “She made this world wider for women and more homelike for humanity.”

Among Chicago’s 12 mayors buried at Rosehill is “Long John” Wentworth, (terms 1857-58 and 1860-61) who at 6 feet 6 inches and 300 pounds, believed bigger is better. His 72-foot granite obelisk is the largest in Illinois. Roswell B. Mason was mayor during the Chicago Fire and telegraphed neighboring cities: “Before morning, 100,000 people will be without food and water. Can you help us?” He also was an engineer who worked to reverse the Chicago River.

Other noteworthies are Charles G. Dawes, vice president under Calvin Coolidge, a Nobel Peace Prize winner and composer of a No 1 Big Band-era hit, “It’s All in the Game"; Norman Wade Harris, founder of Harris Bank, whose mausoleum is based on the Pantheon in Rome; merchants Richard Sears, Montgomery Ward, aquarium donor John Shedd; and Julius Rosenwald.

The chairman of Sears Roebuck & Co., Rosenwald (1862- 1932) was one of the richest men in Rosehill, but he has just a simple headstone. He donated $7 million to start the Museum of Science and Industry and the equivalent of $70 million in today’s dollars for 5,300 schools that educated African Americans in the South.

Both Graceland and Rosehill have large German and Scandinavian populations, as well as Japanese. Rosehill, still used by 500 families annually, has always been open to people of all faiths and origins, Walavich said. Its newer waves are Vietnamese, Korean and Chinese immigrants.

But the main difference between the two is that Graceland is strictly a family cemetery, whereas Rosehill encompasses more brotherhood plots: the Masonic ones A. Allen noted, or the Oddfellows or the typographical union.

In some cases, men may have come to Chicago and never married as they became involved with their careers. They chose to be buried with the identities and the people who were important to them, Walavich said. He has noted some women buried next to their Mason husbands, which would be fitting if they were Eastern Star members, he said.

Union soldiers of the Civil War, perhaps those who were transported to Chicago and later died of injuries, also have special sections. In 1993, a Sons of Union Veterans group replaced the worn headstones with new ones displaying the men’s names, ranks, and companies or battalions.

The Illinois St. Andrew Society was founded in 1846 with the express purpose that “no deserving Scot should ever go hungry, or homeless, or without medical care, or be buried in a Potter’s Field.” One of the earliest landowners at Rosehill, the St. Andrew Society provided hundreds of dignified burials to “poor and friendless Scots.”

By Suzanne Hanney

Vendors Lee & Paula visit Oak Woods

By Lee A. Holmes

Mayor Harold Washington’s mausoleum is engraved with the saying, “Remember me as one who tried to be fair,” while an accompanying marker reads, “He loved Chicago.”

Harold Lee Washington was Chicago’s first African American mayor. I like to think we have some things in common. My first name is Lee and his middle name is Lee. We were both born in April; my birthday is April 11 and his April 15.

One of the things I loved about Mayor Washington was that he was a fair man and opened the doors of City Hall to everyone who lived in Chicago, providing you first went through the chain of command to resolve your issue.

Harold Washington's tomb

Photo by Lee A. Holmes and Paula Green.

Three other mayors are also buried at Oak Woods. There’s also the father of gospel music, Thomas Dorsey, who wrote the song, “Take My Hand, Precious Lord,” after his wife and baby died in childbirth; John and Eunice Johnson of Johnson Publishing; columnist Vernon Jarrett; and Nancy Green, the model for the first “Aunt Jemima,” and who recently received a headstone, thanks to the Bronzeville Historical Society. (StreetWise Sept. 28 - Oct. 4, 2020)

I don’t know a lot about history, which is why my partner, Paula Green, and I, took this assignment to visit Oak Woods, at 1035 E. 67th St., where the first burials were in 1860. We were stumbling over gravestones, looking for three Negro League baseball players and the inventor of Cracker Jack, Louis Rueckheim, whose name I can’t pronounce. I love that candy and the baseball song, “Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack.” Ms. Green is saying, “I’m sorry, dead people” as we walk on the grass.

Judge Cornelius Toole's headstone

Photo by Lee A. Holmes and Paula Green.

We never found the baseball players and Rueckheim, but we found new people, like Judge Cornelius E. Toole, whose epitaph reads, “bigger than life and the law,” and who worked with the NAACP.

We went to the Confederate Mound, where 4,200 Civil War soldiers who fought against our freedom are buried. How did that happen?

The National Park Service website says they were Union prisoners of war at Camp Douglas, located at what is now 31st and Cottage Grove. They died of smallpox, poor sanitation and exposure to the elements.

We are looking for the Staples Singers, because in a StreetWise cover story (StreetWise Jan. 8 - 14, 2018), we learned that they marched with Dr. King. On the way there, we found Jesse Owens’s red granite headstone with its Olympic rings on the shore of one of Oak Woods’s four lakes.

Jesse Owens, oh my God, this made my heart pump a little more blood as I looked down at his tombstone and asked Ms. Green to research. She was surprised that he won four Olympic gold medals in the 1936 Berlin Games, that he picked cotton with his parents, who were sharecroppers and children of slaves themselves. Then she sat back and marveled at this man’s accomplishments.

Vendor Paula Green poses with Olympian Jesse Owens' tombstone

Photo by Lee A. Holmes and Paula Green.

We ask what we can do to help our children become great. She talks with me about how Hitler felt when he had preached about Aryan superiority and then it was a Black man who won gold medals at the Olympics. She smiles and laughs, tickled at how Hitler would have looked, his reaction to this amazing athlete.

We come to an agreement that although this is a one-time assignment, we will come back to research others at Oak Woods. Ms. Green says she will bring a chair and sit near the lake at Owens’ grave.

– Paula Green contributing

Vendor A. Allen visits Rosehill

By A. Allen

Rosehill Cemetery, founded in 1859, is one of the oldest, and at 350 acres, the largest cemetery in Chicago.

The entrance to Rosehill Cemetery, 5800 N. Ravenswood Ave

Photo by A. Allen

Chicago is a wonderful melting pot and so is Rosehill Cemetery. This cemetery is non-denominational and provides services for all traditions, cultures and religions to serve our diverse community.

The gatehouse dates to 1864 and was designed by famous architect William Boyington, who also designed the Chicago Water Tower, one of the city’s most recognizable landmarks.

Located far away from the burnt district of the Chicago Fire of 1871, the gatehouse survived. It is a beautiful entrance, as I found out when I visited there.

A grouping of Masonic graves around a tower

Photo by A. Allen

I also found a lot of love in the cemetery, for Civil War soldiers whose tombstones were replaced in 1993 and among my Masonic brothers, AFAM: ancient free and accepted Masons.

It seems like these brothers had so much love for each other that they chose to be buried together. There was a whole section dedicated to the different lodges. I felt truly good and proud to be a Mason because of the love and dedication I saw in the cemetery.

A Masonic symbol on a tower

Photo by A. Allen

Last, but not least, was the burial site of Frances Pearce and her baby. A statue atop the tomb depicts them lying next to each other, as if they are asleep. You could feel the love that was put into this tomb and many of the huge monuments in the cemetery.

The headstone of Frances Pearce, covered in glass for protection

Photo by A. Allen

I never thought visiting a cemetery that has no kinfolks of mine could be so interesting, but it was, and I am glad I went. I learned a lot that I just wanted to share with StreetWise readers.