The creation of the modern cemetery and the renovation and reorganization of ancient cemeteries, accompanied as they have been by a decided increase in the cost of burial lots and services connected therewith, have given rise to the question: Do we receive value for the money paid, or do the cemetery authorities, taking advantage of the circumstances, tax us unduly in order to provide the necessary means for the furtherance of their pet schemes?

The elaborate care bestowed upon all modern cemeteries and the increased interest taken in the condition of older burial places, are matters of comparatively recent times; the outgrowth of advancing civilization, refinement and' education.

The present conditions introduce the question not only of men and means for present work but also the laying of the foundations upon which future generations may safely build.

The cemetery which in its inception failed to provide for the maintenance of the standard at the present time demanded, by working far too small it margin and laying a foundation too narrow for the structure it is called upon to bear, is today struggling with all the difficulties induced by poverty.

Relative values form a problem, perhaps the most serious one, with which the cemetery superintendent and his associates have to contend. Upon them devolves the responsibility not only of meeting the requirements of the present generation, but of laying the foundation of a system which will enable the cemetery authorities of the future to meet the ever increasing demands of their day.

The prospective purchaser of a cemetery lot is sometimes surprised at what he calls the fancy prices he is called upon to pay, not only for a burial lot, but for services performed thereon. He has vague ideas of the cost of land at so much per acre, of labor at current rates as also of excavating and replacing a few yards of earth. He is apt to overlook the fact, that location; the nature of the ground and some other matters, in the purchase of ground for cemetery purposes, are paramount. A fact which is most usually overlooked by the possessor of vendor of the same. In addition to this, high prices are sometimes charged on account of depreciation of surrounding property.

In laying out the grounds, the best and most expensive talent the country can furnish, is secured. In order to preserve and enhance the beauty of the natural features to be found in some of our park cemeteries, as also in the formation of avenues, plots reserved for ornamental planting and for parked entrances, certain areas of ground must be sacrificed.

When the land has been purchased and large amounts of money laid out and buried, since it is practically dead, in the erection of administration buildings, boundary walls and drains, notwithstanding that the plots most readily available are being disposed of and ground purchased by the acre is being sold by the foot, the expenses and difficulties encountered in making a cemetery have only just begun. Equipment must be purchased; the money expended for this purpose, however, is not dead but lively enough to call for constant reinforcements for renewal and repairs. Swamps must he drained and filled; ledge rock removed and barren land made to grow greensward. Also, judging from a few figures taken at random, enormous sums of money are lying unproductive in the way of unsold ground or stock in trade. One cemetery has lately purchased thirteen acres at a cost of $27,000; another has purchased one hundred and eight acres at a cost of $500,000; another two hundred and three acres at a cost of $200,000. While a cemetery we had the pleasure of visiting two years ago, has, according to its annual report, land valued at $300,000 upon which future generations will realize, but which for some time to come will be a source of expense rather than of income.

It is true that cemeteries are free from taxation, but we must not forget that expenses involved in the maintenance of avenues, of public safety and order are equivalent to the same expenses in towns and cities; and also, that these expenses must be met without the aid of public taxation. The value of real estate invariably moves in one direction. One cannot anticipate the time when under proper management, it will cease to be a source of income. On the other hand, a cemetery lot once sold becomes a source of expense and the trustees holding the money paid for it are on that account responsible for a proportionate share of the expense of administration, repairs and deterioration for all time.

For these reasons, in arranging the prices of cemetery lots a liberal policy must be pursued. The price to be obtained for the lot must cover the cost of purchase, construction and maintenance; and even then the ability to recuperate in case of losses which no amount of business sagacity could have prevented or foreseen must not be lost sight of.

Since nature has decreed that every man shall once in his life perform the office of dying and since the law demands that the dead shall be interred in certain specified grounds and that the control of these grounds shall be placed in the hands of competent and authorized persons, the use and patronage of the cemetery becomes compulsory.

In view of this fact it may be asked: What justification can there be in erecting such expensive structures and making such elaborate layouts as we find in our modern cemeteries, in an institution of public necessity?

The cemetery has simply moved with the times and must be placed in the same class with public buildings, parks, thoroughfares and places of worship. It is not generally considered a hardship that the poorest of us have to contribute, directly or indirectly, to the maintenance of these things.

The expenses connected with our final departure vary with locations and conditions, and like all other expenses are largely influenced by the prevailing custom of the times. The time when the dead were carried out and buried at the least possible expense consistent with decency has passed. Instead, the question invariably asked is: Is there anything more we can do?

Among those whom mortuary expenses affect the most seriously, the expense is lavished upon the funeral which tomorrow is but a memory; while the cemetery, the last resting place of dear friends, which is visited by the family for time without limit, receives but scant attention; and I think it safe to say, that in the majority of cases, the money paid for superfluities exceeds the amount paid to the cemetery including the cost of the ground.

As in life, so in death; the character or quality of our abode must be in keeping with the quantity of this world's goods which has fallen to our share. The rich will own an ample plot which is approached by broad and well-kept avenues and crowned by an expensive monument; while the poor will be laid away in a crowded neighborhood and his resting place will be known to the officials and remembered by a few friends.

The value of services must be measured by the same standard as the value of lots. It is quite likely that a contractor would be able to open and refill a grave at a less figure than that charged by the cemetery. An irresponsible gardener would grade your lot for ten to twenty percent less. Most of us have had some experience with foundations built by monument dealers.

The results of this kind of figuring are to be seen in nearly all cemeteries not established upon modern lines. In addition to the actual first cost there are the expenses of perpetual administration which, like Banquo's ghost, "Will not down." A general and uniform arrangement of graves and grading must be maintained and a record of all burials and many other classes of work kept. The Superintendent is often called upon to give account of work done by himself or by his predecessor a score or two of years previously. So that if graves were opened and all other work performed at contractor's prices, a substantial fee must be charged or a tax imposed upon all work done in the cemetery.

In comparing work done in the cemetery we must bear in mind that a great part of the work is done under conditions not found outside; for building foundations and burial vaults and for all work connected with burials we cannot arrange a date. A sufficient number of men must be kept on hand to execute any order promptly and for whom it is sometimes impossible to find profitable employment.

I find that the charge for opening a grave in a large cemetery is from five to seven dollars. In the smaller cemeteries it is nearer three dollars. In the larger cemeteries more money is demanded for a single grave than we get for a family lot. Our forms of burial are simple; we dispense with uniformed attendants, shelter tents, rubber mats and lowering devices.

It is needless to say, of course, that our margin is correspondingly small. We have a less imposing administrative staff and if we have not a simpler way of keeping records we have a cheaper place in which to keep them.

There is a credit side to this question we must not fail to look at. As the cemetery improves in appearance and increases in wealth and importance, so increase the responsibilities and expenses. Your superintendent must be a man of sterling worth; of qualifications too numerous to mention here; and he will not fail to realize that the laborer is worthy of his hire.

Cemetery work creates within the heart of the Superintendent a feeling of fealty so strong that nothing but a call to the better land or to a better position will sever the bond between him and his employer. Taking any other position with an equal number of patrons to serve, equally important interests to guard and requiring the same amount of general ability and technical skill as the positions filled by the cemetery Superintendent and his assistants, together with the remuneration received therefore and the Superintendent and his assistants would not gain much by the comparison.

A man who embraces any other branch of professional or mercantile life expects to be able to retire in time to enjoy a few years of life between the office and the cemetery. He not only expects to be able to glide down the hill of life easily, to make ample provision for his family but invariably leaves a lucrative business to give his sons a start in life.

The cemetery Superintendent invariably dies in harness and leaves behind for his family nothing but the leg of a stocking with a few odd dollars he may have been able to put into it.

Your clerical staff and your responsible men must be up to the standard and you will find that a good man will not work for a cemetery for less than he can obtain elsewhere where there are chances of promotion or of partnership. In the interests of the cemetery the remuneration must be liberal enough to insure not only their conscientious labor but their hearty interests.
 
It is not my intention in this paper to criticize the principles upon which the modern cemetery is conducted, neither to pile up figures upon figures and facts upon facts nor to weary you with innumerable comparisons when there are so many men waiting to give us the benefit of their wider experience. As this may be read by some outside the brotherhood I have perhaps gone a little wide of technicalities and spoken in a general way of a few important matters with which the general public does not always trouble itself.

I am aware that I have not offered you much information, but with my limited experience I will be honored if I may have opened the way' for the better informed to do so.

If I may make free with the words of a celebrated humorist: "I have not told you all of the truth" about the relative values of cemetery lots and services, but enough to show my seniors and superiors in the profession, the necessity of their giving us information upon this subject, which I hope they will lose no time in doing.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 23rd Annual Convention
Held at New York City, NY
September 14, 15 and 16, 1909

It always makes a pleasant introduction to see so many visitors and friends having an opportunity to enjoy what Kansas City is decidedly proud of a chance to get out in the woods while still in the city, a chance to get out and see the really great work that Kansas City has authorized.

In what I shall say this afternoon, I wish to emphasize the cemetery, while a place of rest, as being at the same time an essential portion of the park system of every city in the country. You can hardly go anywhere now in the United States where the cemetery itself is not as fine in appearance, as well kept, as any park and fully as attractive; not particularly as a pleasure resort, of course, but certainly as an attractive spot out of doors, where people can feel free to enjoy everything that nature presents to us in all the different forms in different parts of the world. And in that direction I think it worth while to call particular attention to the great contrasts we find in so many different cities. Of course the dominant note of the cemetery today as distinguished from a graveyard, if you please, is the park effect. In contrast with that I have in mind particularly one city in the country where for nearly two miles in length and perhaps a quarter to a half mile in width there is a rich private cemetery that is one succession of stone yards, that in outline gives contrast and perhaps, if you please, the horrible example. Truly, therefore, it is a pleasure to see now in the development of the work a consistent effort towards maintaining the cemetery more as a park than as a burying ground. Undoubtedly, of course, the superintendents have all the trouble in the world in keeping the gentlemen who have charge of the financial end of it from saying that a stone shall go here or there against the rules and regulations and the canons of good taste; but, after all, that becomes a minor thing. This property itself illustrates the park idea, as do so many of the larger cemeteries in the downtown regions, where they do become essential portions of the pleasure drives. Throughout the whole country, where you gentlemen can work out your cemeteries in that way, you are but doing the same work exactly that the designers of great public work are doing; and every effort that you can make to avoid the conditions that I have mentioned will be immensely appreciated by those interested in particular properties, but especially by the whole city. In contrast with the great stone yards that you find throughout the country you can each of you think of your own properties where you have left open grounds, where you have planted bits of green, trees or shrubs, where you have avoided the garishness of too much of floral schemes. I am sure the appreciation comes to you immediately in values as well as in good appearance.

It may be interesting to recall what some of the European countries have been doing for centuries, which you will find in sharp contrast with the truly American idea of the cemetery as a park. If was my good .fortune some years ago to be in Vienna on All-Souls Day, Vienna with its two or three millions of people, having really only one cemetery, a great municipal property, every portion of it enclosed partly by iron fence and partly by walls, every grave raised from one to two feet high and on that particular day and especially in the evening, a light burning on every grave. Of course the whole was an exceedingly interesting thing; but it illustrates the very great progress made in that direction and initiated in the United States. They are all going in that direction now and they all imagine that they are the pioneers in the work; but if you will look back to the early work in this country you will find that it antedates everything in every other country and perhaps the first and largest work of that kind is in "Spring Grove." From that everyone has developed in his own particular way a park that is well worthy everywhere of being incorporated into the park system. In St. Louis I have endeavored to incorporate the two great cemeteries on the north into the final park system by bringing King's Highway into touch with it. In Indianapolis today we are working out a boulevard system that will take in "Crown Hill" on one side. In Syracuse, NY, I noticed not long ago the very beautiful showing made by "Oakwood" and "Morningside" and a boulevard projected along the side of them shows these two properties to be perfect parks in themselves.

In the case of this property where we are today, although quite a distance east of the city, the Blue Ridge road lying on the hills just west of us will undoubtedly become a part of the great system of pleasure drives, and this property will be fitted into the Kansas City system.

The whole idea, however, that has impressed me regarding the incorporation of these properties into the public systems is that, in the absence of the "stone yard," the great open places of our cemeteries become as important as any, of our parks or the open places of every city. And looking in that direction, I wish very much you might encourage your sales agents to sell land rather than to sell stone.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 22nd Annual Convention
Held at Kansas City, MO
August 11, 12 and 13, 1908

The chief object in writing this paper is to show as near as possible the true value and character of this association, to the new members and the young men.

I think they should know something of what the old members have gone through with, in order to accomplish our present high standard of proficiency.

Satan is our strongest adversary in every walk of life and the cemetery is no exception to the rule.

Prior to 1887 or the inception of the AACS, the graveyard, as they were usually called at that time; but the most appropriate name would have been the wilderness of Satan.

Satan behind the monument,
Satan behind the shrub and tree,
Satan in every pathway,
Satan looking for you and for me.

The monuments in those days had little or no character at all. They were mutilated by all sorts of lettering, emblems and epitaphs such as,

Beneath this mound lies all we found
Of little Johnny Green,
Who went one night by candlelight
To get some gasoline.

In the twenty years past, the influence and better judgment of the superintendent alone has been very marked indeed, so that we now have monuments with character, grace, dignity and true art, and with no lettering on them but the family name. So you can readily see we have succeeded in driving Satan away from the monument.

The shrubs and trees, I say, have had Satan behind them too, for it keeps the superintendent continually alert for the almost endless variety of insects and each year brings some new imp of Satan for us to battle with, but with the aid of so many good sprays now on the market and such thorough hand books on entomology it is not much trouble for the active superintendent to keep his trees entirely free from Satan.

Perhaps it would be proper here to mention some of his imps that infest the tree. Gypsy moth, Umber moth, Leopard moth, Tiger moth, Ermine moth, Goat moth, Lackey moth, Thrips moth, Gold-tail moth, Brown-tail moth, March moth, Brindled Beauty moth, pine bark beetles and pine Weevils, musk beetles, sawflies, San Jose scale and the tree borer.
The avenues where Satan was always in evidence and especially after every heavy rain, both in wash-outs and with many varieties of weeds. Those that are fortunate enough to have cement curb and gutters on all grades and with the aid of the weed killer (several good formulas) and the practical and scientific methods employed by the up-to-date superintendent, we have succeeded in driving Satan from the avenues.

The lawns are not without their troubles with this same Satan.  There is the cutworm, the Tipulide or grubs, black and red ants, wireworms, and ground moles, all here to test our faith and patience.

Since the inception of this organization the active or progressive superintendent has driven Satan farther and farther until now he has him very close to the boundary line, if not out altogether. So that now, the name could well be, "God's Acre Beautiful or "Silent Park of Repose."

For the benefit of the young man, and the new members, I should like here to enumerate some of Satan's vexations that the older members had to encounter, before and since the inception of this organization. But I am delighted to report at this time that most all of these annoyances of the devil are now things of the past.

There was the hedge fence, the iron fence and the post and chain fence, the small wooden fence around single graves, the stone coping, shells, toys, toy houses, glass globes, tin wreathes, tripods, wire arches, gravel walks, terrace lots and all the other old tin and glass ware they did not want at home they took out to the cemetery.

The inception of this organization placed before us in the far distance an object to be attained. What was that object? Men in life and especially men of the American people are usually actuated by that indomitable spirit of gain, of honors, or wealth for themselves. What was the aim of these few men twenty years ago? What was that high ideal that they placed a way up in the sky shining like diamonds in the stars? That was to benefit mankind.

It was not to attain any present gain of great honors or high position. No, it was on the contrary, taxing them to their greatest abilities to achieve for the benefit of the common masses of humanity safety, and for your profession, for your calling, the title, position, elevation and advancement that should be in keeping with the progress of the age.

The present age is preeminently the age of progress.

The present age is preeminently the age of the young man and I am very much pleased to see so many young faces grace this assembly here today, as these very old members that have worked so faithfully for you, are one by one passing to their reward into that higher life of the soul unseen by mortal vision.

And now, gentlemen, with this heritage handed down to the young man, and the new members, these men of perhaps higher education that have been breathing in the spirit of progress of the age, what can we not expect? Will you not appreciate the efforts of these men so unselfishly accorded? Will you not endeavor to discharge the duties as not to bring reproach or anything like reproach or disgrace upon these efforts?

It should, I think, emulate in you higher ideals and nobler actions, to higher aims and greater achievements. Therefore, in all your considerations, in all your deliberations, please be careful to maintain the purity of this ideal.

Please give these older members credit for what they have accomplished in the face of so much discouragement. You have far better laws. Don't prostitute these laws. Don't misuse them. Don't aim to make them ends for personal gain. But hold them in the highest possible respect to the end that the whole nation may honor and respect you for it.

I am pleased to see so many ladies here. Manifestly there are fewer branches that exclude them in the higher walks of life. I am pleased to see them, for their gentle influences carry refinement, higher aims and nobler thoughts into our hearts and minds.

What we want to plead for, is not primarily new resolutions, it is a new life. I hope that we may see the difference. We need a new conception of what we are living for, a new picture of the sort of life which it is worthy of a man to live. You must have this or your good resolutions surely come to naught.

No haunt of nature is more sympathetic or attractive than the small, well-kept and well embellished lake or stream in the cemetery.

It is ever singing a song to the understanding heart. The friendliness of its babble touches the chord that vibrates when a kindred spirit reveals itself in the light of a human eye.

To my neighbor and friend, "drive away Satan" and join the AACS. You will find it the most intelligent movement ever conceived and carried out by the cemetery superintendents for their own moral betterment, higher ideals, intellectual and social advancement.

This association is made up almost exclusively of members of one profession. There are now very close to 600 members in the national and auxiliary associations combined.

We are looking for new members of course all the time, but they should be men of the right kind of material, not selfish and impartial, but always ready to impart what little you do know. "No Satan in that." But the man that does not want to impart same of his knowledge to others has Satan about him at all times.

Every cemetery should receive all, strangers and especially the commercial travelers, with a hearty and most cordial welcome. Do not be like some churches to the Sunday visitor, receive them with a coldness and indifference that make them wish they had never gone to that place and declare that they will never go back. Satan has first lease on that place.

It is one of the singular things about this business that the devil never takes a vacation, whilst most business men do, one or two times every year.
Satan is continually sowing the seeds of sin. What will you do with them, destroy them or cultivate them?

Satan with some of your employees,
Satan with same of your lot owners,
Satan in some of your drain tiles,
Satan looking for you and for me.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 20th Annual Convention
Held at Detroit, MI
August 21, 22 and 23, 1906

I wish to review for a moment a bit of the history of this great institution called a cemetery. Cemeteries are old. The beginning of civilization saw cemeteries. We see individuals and we wonder what is behind them. We wonder what may be their background. We see institutions and we also wonder what is behind them. We wonder what may be their background. As Bryan once said, he was interested to know the background of the human race, but he was more interested in knowing what might be its future. The ancestors might have been monkeys; but he wanted to know whether or not the people who came afterward were going to continue to be monkeys.

The definition of the word "'cemetery" is what? A cemetery is defined as a "sleeping chamber or burial chamber". Its derivation is from a Greek word. They had during the earlier years in Frankfort and in Munich a building at the entrance to each cemetery. In the middle of this building there was one room in which a warden remained on watch. On either side of that room there were four or five "sleeping chambers". As the dead were brought to the cemetery each body was placed in one of these rooms. On one finger of each corpse a small ring was placed and from that ring a string was connected with a bell located in the chamber where the warden sat. For a period of time until that body began to decompose the warden or his assistant sat there listening for the tinkle of that bell in order that there should be no premature interment. This is one phase of the beginning of a cemetery.

Much progress has been made in cemetery development since that period. The Turks had the most interesting type of early cemetery development. They were the first people to inaugurate so called landscape composition into cemetery design. They made it a practice, as has been heretofore pointed out in some of your sessions, to plant a cypress tree beside each grave at the time of each burial.

What was the reason for the development of the churchyard as a cemetery? The churchyard developed because of a desire to provide a place immediately associated with the building of worship where they could hold prayer in connection with their cemetery for those who had departed and whose remains could be kept dose to the place of worship. We know what has happened with the churchyard. We know the reasons why burials have been removed from the catacombs, from the basements of churches, and from the churchyards to the rural cemeteries. We know that more than a century ago Mt. Auburn was one of the first rural cemeteries in this country. We know further that not until the middle of the nineteenth century did the English government pass a law making it compulsory to establish rural cemeteries.

That is a somewhat abridged history of cemetery development. I have often said during my study of cemeteries that we have three kinds of cemeteries today. We have the abandoned cemetery. We have the neglected cemetery and we have the cemetery that is perfectly maintained. 

To which of these kinds of cemeteries are you going to confine your interest? I would much rather see an abandoned cemetery where nature has taken possession, as you sometimes see in the country districts, than to see a neglected cemetery. There is landscape composition in nature's own way in an abandoned cemetery, and an atmosphere which it is very difficult for any modern mind in the act of creating artificial cemetery design to duplicate. If a cemetery is degenerating into the neglected type, then I should much prefer that it be abandoned and nature be given an opportunity to take possession in its own way. 

What is a modern cemetery? It should not be as some believe, a mere "city of the dead". A modern cemetery, in my opinion, has for its primary purpose the establishment of a place of quiet and of worship; a place into which one may go, surrounded by a proper atmosphere to remember the dead. A cemetery should be a tangible and material evidence showing to the community at large and to the world in general, the respect which we have for those who have gone before. The very air we breathe and the pictures of nature there surrounding us should inspire a solemn tribute to the dead.

There are two schools of cemetery design. One school holds that a cemetery may be a field of monuments. The other school holds that the cemetery ought to be practically free from monuments and therefore virtually a park. Neither school in its extreme view will appeal to the majority of us as being correct. I think there are very few of us in this gathering who hold a view very strongly in either of these extreme directions.

A cemetery of the modern type should provide seclusion. That subject has been discussed before you. A cemetery should provide a dignified atmosphere, quite the contrary of the modern idea of living. It should be a very definite expression of a sincerity of religions purpose without being overloaded from that viewpoint. It should be a spot of hallowed ground that is valuable equally for the dead as it is for the living. It should above all, as a material asset in it community, be one of the choke beauty spots of any community with which the cemetery is associated. It should be a place in which you feel that your first desire is to lapse into that so called coma of introspection and retrospection that appeal so strongly in any well designed church.

I have been in cathedrals and I have walked out of the door only to turn around and go back. Why!—because in those cathedrals there was a something in the whole composition which without music or words or any contact with any person had become a part of me. I turned and walked back because I could not feel that I was doing justice to the church or to myself to go away without again endeavoring to absorb more of that atmosphere.

To a certain extent I have tried to describe the feeling that we ought to have when visiting a properly designed cemetery filled with the right kind of landscape composition. A cemetery must be in its last analysis a piece of design. A church is a piece of design. The railroad station is a piece of design. The Public Auditorium is a piece of design. There should, however, be that something in every one of these material things which causes you upon entering it to feel intuitively the purpose for which it exists. You may either have an impulsive desire to pass directly through and to condemn somebody because they did not make the widest and straightest path through it, or you may want to stop, meander around and absorb the atmosphere created by its design. You immediately feel that there is a something in that design that becomes a part of you and to which you must give expression before going away from it. Such an atmosphere and such a reaction must be created by good landscape composition in cemetery design.
I know of no better way to accomplish that purpose than through the agencies of architecture and landscape architecture. I know of no one factor in cemetery design which can do more to create this atmosphere than good landscape composition.

You ask me to define landscape composition. It is a rather intangible thing. You might as well ask what is musical composition. The gentleman who just sang knows musical composition and it radiates from every fiber of his body. He has associated himself with a musical atmosphere. He has studied so far as he could those material things that help him to get a musical point of view and to get in a position where his entire being reacts true to things musical. He has lived in that atmosphere. He has steeped his soul in it with the result that you and I derive great pleasure from music as he now produces it. Landscape composition is similar. It is an art. Anyone who is identified with a cemetery may endeavor to put into that cemetery those things which represent landscape composition and which radiate a worth while message to everybody that comes into that cemetery. The person who assumes that responsibility cannot simply say "I know landscape composition and I am going to produce it as a part of my cemetery design." He must first qualify by asking himself—"what is this intangible thing called landscape composition?" I want to study it. I want to absorb it. I want to be able to create that atmosphere of design resulting from good landscape composition, because it is the thing that I feel so strongly. I want to be certain that after I have done my work someone else is going to feel as I feel. Without these qualifications I should advise no man to try to put into a cemetery the atmosphere of cemetery design, any more than I should expect the layman contractor could put into a church design those elements of architectural composition which convey that message of real church architecture.

There are two phases to landscape composition in cemetery design. One of them is in the plan as laid out on paper. The other is in the thing that we put into that cemetery that gives it those other dimensions.

We have been in cemeteries where the plan appeals strongly to us. We immediately feel that the whole plan is coordinated. We have been in other cemeteries where we feel that someone has taken "a waffle iron" or something akin to it, laid it down on a piece of ground and cut out the streets accordingly and then dropped some monuments around, together with a few trees for good measure. This is one type of design.

We have been in other cemeteries where because or the well designed monuments, proper settings for these monuments, trees of a desired type property located, attractive buildings well located, we feel that the picture is complete and that it is truly a place in which to think of our departed loved ones and friends. We have found no false note anywhere. That kind or a cemetery does not simply grow without man's intelligent assistance. The man who produces such a composition must have trained himself and he must have lived in an atmosphere of that kind of education in landscape composition. Otherwise, he is helpless to create that real type of cemetery. Many mistakes of doctors and others are buried in a cemetery, soon to be forgotten. The mistakes made in landscape composition refuse to be buried. Each time that we make a mistake in landscape composition that mistake continues as the years go by to magnify and to grow until some day it comes out and stares us in the face and we in turn wish we might be buried. It is a great responsibility to assume when one attempts to put landscape composition into cemetery design.

When I endeavor to define landscape composition I am often reminded of the definition of the word "power" as applied to mental activity. "Power is the width or the margin between the exactions of a task that a man is performing and his character reserve." The captain of a great ship may stand on the bridge when the sun is shining and the ocean is smooth. You may think that he has the easiest job in the world. He has a fine uniform, he only walks up and down on the bridge and he has the one "spotlight" table in the dining room and nothing else to worry him. Some night when you go out on the deck with a hurricane blowing, the ship rolling around and you cannot see ahead in fog and you know that there are thousands of lives on that vessel being carried safely to their destination, you then begin to realize the power of that man. It is character reserve that is called into being to enable film under such conditions to perform the great tasks in this emergency.

Landscape composition in cemetery design may be defined as the width of the margin between that kind of a cemetery which will provide a specified number of lots per acre, which will allow one to get from one lot to another over adequate roads and paths, and which will provide for future expansion and the kind of a cemetery which, when you go into it, brings into your being a something which, you cannot analyze and which you cannot define. You only feel that you and God and those gone before you are in close communion. That gentlemen, is landscape composition in cemetery design.

The elements which make for successful landscape composition in a cemetery have been discussed at various meetings. I shall enumerate a few of them. They are as follows: the natural site, one's ability to solve the artificial grading problems in a perfectly natural and efficient way, the proper location and width of roads and walks which first of all must serve as arteries of traffic to give access from one point to another and to serve as important elements of design, the location and type of buildings, the kinds of monuments and headstones and their location, the development of adequate and attractive lawn areas, and the selection and proper placing of plant materials. These are elements which stand out as a part of the design and which may affect the composition or the pictorial, aspects of a cemetery design.

You have had through the papers of Mr. Tupper, Mr. Hare, Mr. Grubb, Mr. Simonds and others some most excellent discussions upon the use to be made of these different elements in order to create a landscape picture. I have no desire to impose upon your time to review these discussions. Their completeness is such that I could hope to do little else.

There are two schools, as I have said, with reference to cemetery design. It is dangerous for one to hold any strong arguments for either extreme. I am reminded of two things in connection with these extreme schools. One is that a conclusion not reached through a process of reasoning can never be changed by a process of reasoning. If a woman likes a black hat, please do not try to tell her that she ought to wear a red hat. The other is the pull-man porter who came to the conductor and said he had two irritable passengers. One passenger insisted that the window be open because he was suffocating with heat. The other passenger insisted that the window be closed because he was freezing. The conductor said to the porter, "You may go back and shut the window until you suffocate one and then open the window until you freeze the other and then proceed in your usual manner."
We must therefore recognize and respect the middle ground of design. Landscape composition properly brought into a cemetery design should endeavor to do those things upon which I have laid stress. It should create a series of interesting pictures. Those pictures should have some dignity. They should have character and above all they should have a great degree of permanence. They should have in them those notes which are not false (such as horticultural varieties with variegated foliage seldom seen in any planting of nature). Those pictures should be in an orderly sort of arrangement. They should create a variety of interest. We should study our cemetery if it be an old cemetery which we are endeavoring to improve, with these thoughts in mind. One of our most difficult and most interesting problems is the renovation and improvement of old cemeteries.

If you go to Lake View Cemetery in Cleveland you will find two of the best examples that I have yet seen in cemetery design. The first example is that of excluding from the cemetery picture those disturbing elements coming from bordering areas of commercial and residential development. The second example is that of a set of pictures interesting and varied in character created by the proper use of plantings of various types in most interesting groups to make the background for different types of monuments.

After all the man who really makes the cemetery, in the last analysis, is the man who lives with that problem day after day and who tries to take either the ideas that he has brought into it as a result of his experience and observation, or the ideas of some professional adviser brought in and left with him, to expand upon and to carry into execution in an effort to produce worth while landscape composition.

We often find in an old cemetery little opportunity to make great improvements. There is small space allowed for planting. Roads and walks are in rectangular lines. Monuments are of average design and too close to each other. Such cemeteries may often be taken, especially those in the rural districts, and with adequate expenditure of money and time, made into most interesting examples of cemetery restoration for the inspiration of the entire countryside. The addition of a well designed entrance, the development of interesting walls and fences, the proper location of planting in spots where planting may be placed, the creation of a frame of foliage for the cemetery, perhaps through the acquisition of a bordering strip of property, the carrying of a theme of foliage or flower effect throughout the cemetery at different periods in the year may work wonders in the improvement of such an area. These elements properly used may tie the entire cemetery into one harmonious unit which causes you to forget entirely an unsightly monument here, or a piece of poor grading there.

I think in a great cemetery such as Lake View or Mt. Auburn or a dozen others, each extending over a large area of property, there is only one thing to do and that is to establish masses of plantings that create a proper and interesting background for monumental work. Such an arrangement, especially of the planting, removes the competitive elements of design so detrimental to one another when one monument is seen with another monument as its background. How many of you live in the fully developed suburbs and have ever looked back at, your own home to determine the landscape composition of its setting, and how often have you realized that a single tree here or a group of planting there to shut out a neighboring house may produce an entirely different looking and more attractive picture of your own home? The same principle applies in the planting with relation to monuments.

The layout of roads in cemeteries is most important. The designer must always keep in mind that he is dealing with cemetery roads and not roads in a subdivision or in a park. Roads in a cemetery should have a texture of surface that presents at all times that quiet rustic simplicity of atmosphere that should pervade the entire area. The cemetery road should lead you aimlessly through the cemetery and this principle should apply to road design except, for one or two of the more important roads which may be used in passing through a cemetery.

A word with reference to the layout of lots in cemetery planning.  I have seen cemetery plans of an important character undertaken by men who assumed to know cemetery design and who in reality had no qualifications to entitle them to render professional service in this field. Their work has imposed upon the community in many instances cemeteries without landscape composition. Apparently their sole purpose has been to get into that cemetery plan a maximum number of lots with little regard to future problems of planting. In my opinion, there is no field of design which is more specialized than cemetery design. If any landscape architect is accepting the obligation to lay out a cemetery and to get into the cemetery design a proper landscape composition, he should have by his side at the very beginning the most competent cemetery expert who has proved by his experience and the work that he has done that he knows those phases of cemetery design which must be recognized for the efficient operations of a cemetery. The design must be a happy solution of the problems of efficiency and operation and maintenance and of real landscape composition.

It is one problem to develop landscape compositions. It is another and an equally important problem to preserve those compositions. There is only one way to properly preserve a landscape composition and that is through continual and perpetual care. There is nothing that changes so rapidly. There is nothing that is so temporary. There is nothing to which so much damage can be done through ignorance or neglect in so short a time as landscape composition.

As cemetery superintendents and executives you have a great mission in life. There is no mission more important. It is not the most profitable from a financial standpoint. Your greatest satisfaction comes from the opportunity to render a worth-while service. You have an obligation to create and to properly preserve these landscape compositions in cemetery design and to make them real assets to the community. It is not the easiest thing to accomplish. The maintenance of one shrub, the maintenance of a group of shrubs, the maintenance of a lawn, roadway, or trees may be an easy thing in and of itself so far as keeping that tree or shrub growing properly, that lawn green, or that road passable. It is quite a different and more difficult thing to perform these maintenance operations so that all of these features heretofore mentioned may assume their proper and permanent relationship in the atmosphere of a proper and desirable landscape composition. Only those men successful in accomplishing these results can tell the great satisfaction or the difficulties.

A cemetery should be so preserved that it continues to express that sentiment and type of design which is symbolic of a cemetery. I do not know of any field of activity which is more worth while or one which requires more study than the proper development and maintenance of cemeteries. I do not know of any field of work where a man may do more good or make a greater impression on humanity in general. After all the greatest permanent satisfaction which we procure from our work is the opportunity to render a real service in a worth while way. A man may continue to be a teacher in one department or he may seek the presidency of a great university. In the first instance, he may do his teaching and have available time within which to accomplish certain ideals and results of a most permanent character, or he may be a president of an institution overburdened with executive and administrative functions to the extent that he can do little of none of the permanent work which will enable his children and their children to find a path "to the place where once he lived." Money is not always the greatest return. It is soon forgotten and dissipated. Work such as you are performing adds something of permanent value to life and it helps to define the "roadway" that permanently marks your efforts and your contributions to humanity.

For my part, I should prefer to be the man who is able and has the opportunity to perform these permanent things which leave tangible and lasting evidence of my work behind me as a monument to me and a monument to my ability, vision and energies which after all far outweigh the temporary qualities of a few dollars.

Your work is such that you are able to leave through the elements of good landscape composition a most desirable impression upon the minds of so many people at a time in their lives when their minds are open and receptive to outside influences. You are developing that kind of composition which comes nearer than anything else to making an indelible impression upon the souls of those persons who as mourners have entered the cemetery and have conveyed their message. That person will find as his mind relaxes another point of view and a new inspiration in life through the elements or landscape composition properly injected into the cemetery design. He will suddenly realize that deep as his sorrow may be, someone has done something for him which conveys a message that is so comforting under such conditions.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 41st Annual Convention
Cleveland, OH
August 22, 23, 24 and 25, 1927

Not wishing to disappoint the program committee, I will, therefore, submit my thoughts to you in the form of a paper to be read by one who I am sure can visualize the picture I wish to portray, I confess the subject is rather unique. It differs from the subject matter submitted in papers written to enlighten us on the problems that come to all of us in our daily routine of every day life, no matter what our environments may be. But when we take a retrospective glance at our past experiences as cemetery men, in our daily endeavor for betterment, we can only admit that the subject conveys and expresses the sentiment that covers the field in which we labor.

I feel that I am deeply indebted to Mr. Conwell for the words, "Acres of Diamonds," that was the subject of one of his masterful lectures some years ago. I was deeply impressed by the way and manner in which he applied them to the lives of men in the field of human endeavor, and by his permission I want to use them in a manner that may lead our thoughts to the "Acres" that have been given into our care, where God's "Diamonds" have been laid away for a time into mother-earth to remain there until the day dawns, when they shall surely shine again.

In our most thoughtful mood we bring back to memory our early experiences, our trials and difficulties, the solving of problems that were counted as rights sacred by our forefathers from time immemorial. The changing from the old to the new, in order to keep pace with modern ideas advanced by men having visions of higher and nobler ideas that in due time would revolutionize the old order of things and be the means of adding grace and dignity to that part of the earth's surface where the human family sleep, into a beautiful garden, has been your task and mine. What we have accomplished will be an exhibition to a marked degree to what extent we may have dedicated our lives to our work. Future generations, I am sure, will applaud our efforts if they are in line with the standards adopted by this organization to follow nature in her planning and designing, as far as lies in our power, so that our work when completed will be a field of "Acres" exhibiting art out-of-door.

In view of the marked changes would it be strange if men should marvel at what has been accomplished in the past four decades or since the birth of this organization, when a small body of men in convention assembled saw the dawn of a new era and banded themselves into an organization for a purpose, because of having coordinate views in the affairs of cemetery management, as well as development that must in due time lead to cooperation and betterment in cemeteries that are the "Acres of Diamonds" scattered, not only over the North American continent; but over the whole world. In the struggle for the higher ideals let us not forget the moments of sunshine as well as the moments of shadows, for they are a part of the every day life of those, whose souls are quickened by the inspiration gleaned from lessons in nature, for nature is the school of our environment in which we live. In it we listen with delight to the song of the birds and are charmed; by the whispering voices that come to us from the sighing breezes that kiss the flowers as well as the trees.

Perhaps it was the chairman's wish that I relate some of my personal experiences during almost forty years of continuous life in cemetery work, some of it being spent in the development of parks, playgrounds and civic improvements, that he wished me to, write an "Letting the Sunshine into a place of Shadows." In the early days of my experiences I found myself pondering over the individual tastes of the bereaved in expressing sincere grief and sorrow for those dear to them and lost for a while, and the method employed, what they believed to be their sacred duty to perform, some outward expression in memory, be it in the erecting of monument, the building up of a huge terrace about their lot, enclosing them with hedges, coping, iron or wooden fences where permissible, the lavish use of weeping trees, especially the use of the willow, anything that would in any way give expression to their bereavement and sadness. All this was interesting to me because the scene when finished portrayed a picture of shadows where even the flowers in their dismal environment failed to bloom for the want of a ray of sunshine. To brighten these places and let the sunshine in was the problem for me to solve, and is the problem that must be solved by everyone into whose hands are given supervision and care of the "Diamonds" laid away for a time in God's Acres. To me it soon became a pleasure for I found that by personal contact and intelligent reasoning, the rays of sunshine penetrated deeper and deeper into the heart of the men and women open to conviction who observed with keen interest the results obtained in the changing from the old to the new order of things in the development of the new additions on modern lines. For in the progress of developments they for themselves, could, in the final analysis, visualize a beautiful garden, where the somber doleful, uninviting scenes would finally pass into oblivion.

In my daily efforts in reconstruction, to bring harmony between past misguided efforts and natures own plan—for if we are at all successful in our endeavors we, must follow nature and learn to imitate her in many ways—guided by such influences the task before me became work most agreeable, for I found quite a steady response of cooperation on the part of those with whom it was my privilege to often meet and discuss the early ways and methods of their ancestors, to which they had fallen heir, in the performance of what they believed to be their duty to build something in some way contrary to nature that would be outstanding and in its appearance differ from that executed in memory by their neighbor. In many instances I found it only necessary to explain certain reasons for contemplated changes to gain their hearty approval and confidence and when the picture of the garden scene, I had in language tried to portray, became a reality, their happiness revealed itself in an atmosphere of sunshine.

May I at this time say a word of encouragement, as well as advice, to those young in this great organization who have entered the field of cemetery management in neglected Acres where reconstruction is the key to advancement on modern lines in landscape planning as we see it today. It is well to give an exhibition of your ability to prove your worth in being able to master the problems. By all means court the confidence of your people or your daily efforts for betterment may be full of shadows and your ideals go on the rocks.  Diplomacy is one of the prerequisites of an efficient superintendent. He who can sympathize and bring sunshine to those who come in sorrow from homes where shadows have fallen will surely gain the favor and respect of the bereaved. He will play a leading part in community betterment and will ever be upheld in his efforts when making more beautiful the "Acres of Diamonds" in which he labors.

Perhaps the thoughts and sentiments that I wish to leave with you in this convention can better be expressed in the following lines:

God's Acre is planted with diamonds
Whose luster the world could not see
Till death had polished the treasure
To a beauty that ever shall be.

In soft holy silence they rest there,
Safe guarded in crypt or in green
And like a rare gem in its setting,
They glow with a heavenly sheen.

Under full gleam of the sunshine
Under soft veil of the shade,
These delicate diamonds now resting,
Will never lose luster, nor fade.

The years that sweep over the acres,
The memories deep as the heart,
Shall increase the worth or the diamonds;
From whom we have seemed to part.

But they're ours and God's for the ages
They are treasures that love cannot lose,
They are kept for the crown of adorning,
When he His crown jewels shall choose.

Do we tread the soft acres in sorrow?
Do our tears bathe the flowers and grass,
As hidden from view these fair diamonds
Regard not our grief as we pass?

Be comforted heart that is lonely,
Be grateful that treasures are there,
You will walk across "Acres of Diamonds"
Whose worth is beyond all compare.

Thank God for the beautiful setting,
He gives to His jewels and gems,
For the diamonds are placed for His purpose,
And never a stone He condemns.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 41st Annual Convention
Cleveland, OH
August 22, 23, 24 and 25, 1927

Beginning as early as 1825 Dr. Jacob Bigelow started the movement for the removal of human bodies from church cellars and other sepulture in the city of Boston to the better method of laying out a garden cemetery which should be located a few miles from the cities with the primary object in view of protecting the general health of the public and as stated in his own words "To desire the institution of a suburban cemetery in which the beauties of nature should as far as possible relieve from their repulsive features the tenements of the deceased; and in which at the same time some consolation to survivors might be sought in gratifying, as far as possible, the last social and kindred instincts of our nature.”  It was indeed a far sighted idea on the part of Dr. Bigelow and one which spread rapidly in succeeding years to all parts of the United States. The Modern Cemetery with its engineering and landscape features of today is a logical outcome of this initial movement.

It is now over one hundred years since this important step for a better disposition of human remains started and in this period of time there have been many changes and additions to the original conception of what a cemetery should be so that the larger cemeteries of the present time represent the collective human experience of many minds and probably the largest single influence in this period has been the American Association of Cemetery Superintendents. In such a gathering as this, which is the fortieth that has assembled, it is inevitable that ideas and ideals start for or realized by its present members, and it is with this thought in mind that I am going to review particularly the engineering characteristics which we may find in a cemetery and which are naturally the outcome of many years of experience in this special line of work.

LANDSCAPE: I have divided the particular engineering features under the headings with the sub-division illustrating the details as applied to this work. The outstanding feature of course is landscape work. This necessitates a study of topography of the land, a study of roads and paths, trees, shrubs and equipment which will reveal to the best advantage the natural landscape which may be available. Constructions have been made so that vistas thru the trees and shrubs will show ponds and lakes, monuments and slightly beds and observation towers which are existent. Embankments and special ground are planted to shrubs, vines and trees not only for effective landscape but also to lessen the maintenance of certain grounds.

PLANT AND MAINTENANCE: In order to carry out the construction work and maintenance of a cemetery it is of course essential to have a plant with proper buildings thereon which shall necessitate the least amount of steps and in the larger cemetery adjacent to these buildings a railroad side track is very convenient, not only for unloading cement, sand and necessary material but also for the purpose of taking in monuments and mausoleum granite. In addition to side track facilities we have the following buildings: Garage for trucks, Blacksmith Shop, Carpenter Shop, Mechanics Shed for tools and derricks, Laborers Shed and tools, Grass-cutters Shed, Perpetual Care Shed, Housing for Power Sprayer, Steam Roller, Gas Engine and pump, Men’s Lounging room and Yard Office. One engineer says "Our structures begin to wear out even before they are completed, hence the necessity for maintenance." Depreciation and the need of repairs for buildings and equipment are self evident to anyone and the condition of the plant is dependent upon constant inspection followed by decision and action to hold every part of it to as near as possible 100 percent maintenance. When our perpetual care fund runs up to a considerable amount it seems that the word maintenance covers the greater part of our work.

ROADS: Due to the demand of present traffic conditions it essential that every cemetery shall have good roads and it therefore becomes part of the work of modern cemeteries to build their own roads and in this work there is a very large opportunity for every cemetery superintendent to improve the existing grades as well as to build roads of such material and in such a manner that the grades are easy that the surface material will stay for a great many years and that no weeds will have an opportunity to grow. Preliminary work in road construction necessitates proper drainage by piping and this in turn would become also the problem of proper surface drainage in every part of the grounds so that the soil in every section is clear and drained of water in winter as well as in summer. In order to carry this thru it is sometimes necessary to recognize the mistakes made in early days and consequently raise the grades of paths that the roadways shall always be the lowest point in the topography of the grounds with the exception of course of any natural lakes or ponds that exist.

Our experience so far leads us to construct the roads as follows: The standard road is 18' in width. After the road is brought to proper grade by excavation and fill and the gravel for proper material for the road bed spread the width of the roadway, the whole bed is thoroughly rolled being drenched with water at the same time so that a solid and substantial road bed will be ready to receive the constructed surface. The construction surface begins with 4" to 5" of 2½" crushed stone thoroughly rolled and it is a fact that at the present time particularly where the road slopes in the direction of its length that the surface is made practically flat but where the road is almost level a crown should not exceed 2" in an 18' width. The six to twelve inch crown on a gravel road of years gone by is really dangerous construction for present traffic. After the 2½ crushed stone has been thoroughly rolled all depressions noted, and properly filled, then the whole is covered with tarvia or other bitulithic material at the rate of 1½-2 gallons per square yard. After this tarvia is spread, ½" crushed stone in as thin a layer as possible is spread over this surface. This is then thoroughly rolled again and after being thoroughly rolled is covered with one coat of tarvia at about ½ gallon to the yard which we call the sealing coat. Next a very thin layer of clean sharp sand is scattered over this surface and worn in by traffic.

I have known a road constructed in this manner to lay for almost twenty years without any further treatment than occasional coating of tarvia and sand. I believe a road of this nature is one of the least expensive that any cemetery can build. Concrete for road construction in my judgment in a cemetery is unnecessary, except in special cases where grades are so steep that a roller will not work efficiently. We have such a problem and are building this small piece of road according to the Mass. State Highway Specification.

About twelve years ago after completing a road, I remember the roller engineer telling me that we had so improved the grade on this particular piece of road that he only required one half the steam pressure to go over the hill that he had to have before; what this means in the saving of foot power and horse power I will leave to your imagination but I'll wager that the foot power or horse power saved will never be known to the ones who are using this highway. However, this thought should never prevent us from doing all our construction work as the best engineering science demands it should be done.
 
WATER SUPPLY: Due to the large amount of vegetation which is an essential part of a good cemetery, a water supply is very necessary equipment and a great many cemeteries for this reason have their own pumping stations. At Mount Auburn Cemetery this equipment includes 28-2½" driven wells varying in depth from 52' to 125'. It is a fact that practically all water from driven wells contains a large amount of iron and iron in water for cemetery purposes is very undesirable for the reason that it discolors all stonework with which it comes in contact.

By means of aerating equipment the iron in the water is readily oxidized, the water then flows over charcoal beds and sand filters which not only entirely remove the iron but also other impurities that may be in the water. From the sand filters the water flows into a clear water basin and is then pumped up to the reservoir where it flows into the mains to all parts of the grounds. There are also fountains and ornamental sprays which if used in connection with the water supply of a city would probably be considered 'an unnecessary luxury. The Pumping Station contains a low lift pump driven by a 5 Horse Power Electric Motor which pumps the water from the wells to the aerator and onto the charcoal and filter beds and also a high lift pump driven by a 25 horse power motor which pumps the water from the clear water basin up to the reservoir. Both pumps are automatic in control being governed by floats actuating electric switches.

CONCRETE: At the present time concrete more than any other material is being used in modern constructions and engineering work. In our case concrete is used as follows: Foundations for monuments and mausoleums, for paths, roads, chimneys, benches and greenhouse constructions. Our Half Hardy House is practically all concrete and we have a concrete wall 10' high around one half mile of the cemetery which at the present time due to its adaptability not only protects that part of the grounds particularly well but because of its lending itself so well for planting purposes is more ornamental than any form of cemetery fence which I have seen. The only wall that possibly equals a concrete wall for protection and ornamentation would be of brick construction such as one sees in English gardens but this would be more expensive and not as durable.

CREMATORY: I am in accord with the late James Currie of Milwaukee, that the day is not far distant, in fact, may be said to be already here when no cemetery of any importance will be fully prepared to accommodate its patrons if not equipped with a crematory as a medium for the disposal of the dead.

The cemetery and crematory should not be considered as standing in opposite and antagonistic positions and that cremation is not inimicable but in reality conducive to the prosperity of a cemetery."

The crematory at Mount Auburn Cemetery consists of a well designed chapel, the upper part of which contains an organ, vestry and all the necessary background for holding: proper services. In the basement of this building are tour retorts capable of taking care of twenty-five to thirty bodies in one day. In back of the retorts towards the rear of the building is a subterranean passage about 40' in length and leading northerly away from the main building, this enters into a building which is made entirely of concrete and which is wholly underground except the glass skylight overhead which measures 12' x 10'. In this engine room is a centrifugal compressor which is capable of delivering 1600 feet of free air a minute to the retorts above. This is operated by a 25 Horse Power electric motor being supplied with current from the local Electric Light Company. As an auxiliary on the opposite side of the engine room is a gas engine coupled to a Root's blower which can be used if the electricity should for some reason not be available. Just outside of the engine room but adjacent to it is a heating plant for all buildings of the crematory unit. This uses oil as fuel, is automatically operated and as a matter of fact is the best heating unit we have in connection with the whole cemetery.

The efficient operation of a crematory is maintained by a knowledge of chemistry as regards combustion and fuel oil; the design and operation necessitates engineering skill which shall assure the elimination of objectionable features, maintain quietness and speed in operation and the creation in the immediate vicinity of an atmosphere which will reflect peace and quietness which is so essential for the people who at this time require the use of this equipment.

MECHANICAL: The necessity for mechanical knowledge in the maintenance of plant equipment is illustrated every day in the ordinary operation of a cemetery and I think is evident in the things which I have enumerated.

CHEMISTRY: In the healthy upkeep of the vegetation which covers so much area, a knowledge of as much chemistry as will lead to successful spraying and fumigation to hold in check or to eliminate entirely insect pests and diseases which are apparently always evident, is certainly a desirable asset for the cemetery manager or his assistants to have.

I am inclined to believe that the average man does not realize that the conducting of a cemetery is a technical business requiring training, skill and experience and the primary purpose of this paper is to show in part some of the technical features involved in the establishing and maintaining of a cemetery as required under present conditions.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 40th Annual Convention
Memphis, TN
October 11, 12 and 13, 1926

Of all the characteristics of a cemetery, which is the most desirable? A cemetery should first of all be comforting. This means that it must be beautiful, restful, secluded. To attain these characteristics it must include within its boundary much of nature.

What is nature? In its broadest significance it includes almost the universe. Some persons use this term as if it were synonymous with the Deity, saying, Nature does this, nature does that, nature's laws are the laws of God. Although we sometimes speak of inanimate nature, it is often personified. Often we hear the expression "Mother Earth", perhaps less frequently nature is referred to as "mother". Mother most endearing of all words. The poet says:

“Nature forever consoling and kind; pours her wine and her oil on the smarts of the mind."

She is represented as soothing and comforting and especially as healing the mind, the part that is in greatest need of healing when a dear friend is left to the permanent care of a cemetery.

Nature, therefore, is the most important feature to have in mind in designing a cemetery. For the purpose of this paper, nature will be considered as that manifestation of the out of doors that is independent of man. We find it in its most attractive and familiar shape in the woods, the borders of lakes and rivers, the hills and valleys, ravines and sky and in the clouds. Nature has infinite variety. When we detect the work of man, as in an orchard, a field of corn; or a row of trees along an avenue, we cease to think of what we see as the work of nature, out rather look at it as man's creation. We see nature when we look at the wooded margin of an open field with its skyline of oaks, its thicket of wild crab apples blooming in the full sun, its viburnums and elderberries. We see her along the rights of way of railroads as we journey from one place to another. In spring or early summer, when we look from a car window, we are greeted with large beds of iris, lupines, shooting stars, spiderworts, butterfly weeds, black-eyed susans, ferns, or a little later, with the flowers or Joe Pye Wood, wild roses, lilies, cardinal flowers, goldenrod, asters and hundreds of others of nature's planting. If the train passes through woods, we may see here and there, as we look from the car window, masses of sassafras, filled with yellow flowers in spring, rich with foliage throughout the summer and gloriously colored with yellows and reds in autumn. We may also see oaks, maples, hawthorns, dogwoods, elderberries, prairie roses, wild grapes clematis, bittersweet and a host of other woody plants all beautiful and all helping to give what we call "the charm of nature." What is this charm which we feel when we go to the woods, when we go to pine forests, when we so to uncultivated prairies which glow with wild sunflowers, asters and goldenrod and when we wander along the wooded banks of lakes and rivers and through wooded ravines? It is difficult to analyze and define, hut it is due to nature's perfect freedom, to beauty of outline and color, to deep shadows and bright lights, to many things being hidden by foliage or inequalities of ground, to the air of mystery that pervades things in which man has no hand.

It is this charm of nature which we should try to introduce into cemeteries. It is this that makes her "consoling and kind". Many cemeteries do not have this charm. Often one sees from the train cemeteries fully exposed to view on all sides and containing only monuments, headstones and a few forlorn trees. Even some pretentious cemeteries with very costly monuments and perfectly kept lawns lack this charm which soothes and comforts.

Are there any cemeteries in which this comforting characteristic can be found? Mr. Strauch introduced it into Spring Grove Cemetery in the naturalistic /borders of the lakes and in the preservation of the wooded ravines. Recently a cemetery has been established on Long Island which bids fair to contain the charm of which I speak. This cemetery, designed by the Olmsteds, is to have no stonework above the ground. A family name may appear on a stone tablet set even with the turf. There is a plentiful supply of shrubbery to separate one lot from another. When nature has had time to correct the inevitable imperfections and rawness of new plantings, this may become one of her most charming retreats. Many cemeteries contain touches of the charm of nature, but I know of none really perfect.

It is true that people's tastes differ and we have different points of view. One telephone man said that to his eye a line of straight telephone poles on each side of a road with arms carrying a plentiful supply of wires was the most beautiful decoration a thoroughfare could have, but I think even he would have hesitated about putting such a decoration in a cemetery. These opinions, however, are evidently somewhat biased. A lover of nature has nothing to sell, no ax to grind. He is merely anxious to have people enjoy with him the beauty that he sees. The appreciation of this beauty is something that must be cultivated in order to be fully enjoyed. Some do not even see a sunset until their attention is called to it. Some see no beauty in winter, while others experience great enjoyment at that season in the branching of trees, the twiggery of shrubs, the snow and the glistening ice-covered branches. There are two or three things which seem desirable in order to secure that beauty of nature which is so comforting. The first is to reduce the amount of stonework either by planting out most of the monuments and headstones, or by reducing them to inconspicuous dimensions. Some of the money that is spent for monuments should be spent in securing more land so that there will be room for shrubs and flowers. We should appreciate the fact that while a perfect lawn is most desirable in some places, there are other places where the ground cover should include other things. Where height is not objectionable, lilacs will often spread out and make a beautiful ground cover when left undisturbed. The same is true of many other shrubs. Where land is poor and sandy perhaps nothing in the shrub line is better for a ground cover than the aromatic sumach, which is beautiful at all seasons, and especially attractive in the fall with its rich coloring. For a still low covering, there are many vines that are suitable. In the deep Shade of woods the Virginia creeper often makes a beautiful cover, hiding the entire ground with a layer of leaves of a delightful green in summer and often richly colored in autumn. Wild violets, myrtle, Japanese spurge, moneywort, ground ivy and carpet bugle are a few of the many beautiful ground covering plants.

In a neglected country cemetery a large area became covered with cypress spurge. This is a beautiful little Euphorbia and while it is often called a weed, it was the most attractive thing in the cemetery being green arid fresh-looking while the grass everywhere else was brown. The neighboring farmer called it cemetery grass and the first question he asked was how to get rid of it. Often, too many so-called bedding plants are used in a cemetery. These bring in revenue and are showy in summer, but they leave the ground bare from October until May. To bring in the charm of nature we should use more hardy perennials. These often beautify waste places in a most satisfactory way. They are on hand from early in the spring until snow comes and even their dead stems and seed vessels are often graceful and beautiful throughout the winter.

Many city dwellers are in the habit of going to northern Wisconsin or northern Michigan for rest and recreation during the summer. Some of these have asked "Why can't I have my cemetery lot like the northern woods which I love 80 much?" These persons certainly feel the charm of nature and would like to have this charm about their final resting place.

The longer we live and the more we observe, the more shall we be convinced of the truth of that oft-repeated saying, "Nature is the best teacher". The superintendent who can introduce foliage and flowers as nature uses them everywhere in covering waste places, creating forests, developing secluded beauty spots and doing all this while concealing his own part in the work will be the most successful in the development of a really worthy cemetery.

In a cemetery well endowed with the charms of nature, one cannot see from end to end and from side to side and on beyond to surrounding buildings or farms. From every point there will be views, some wide, some narrow, and these will be bounded at the sides and terminated by foliage. The side boundaries will not be straight but will recede here and there into bays, tempting one on to see into their depths. Against the foliage will be seen, from time to time, quantities of flowers, wild crab apple blossoms, lilacs, flowers of hawthorn, forsythia and a hundred others. Here and there at the base of the foliage there may at times be the blossoms of iris, peonies, goldenrod, coreopsis and other flowers too numerous to mention or if it is in the fall, there will be attractive fruits, foliage and the blossoms of witch hazel. If there is a hill or ridge, it will be masked at the top with the foliage of trees reaching from the ground to the skyline so that one can easily imagine in looking at the upward slope that it extends on indefinitely to a great height. If there is a valley, the views into its depths will be preserved. There will be extended openings showing at the bottom a green turf or the foliage of low growing plants like moneywort, myrtle or partridge berry, or perhaps, there will be a stream or lake or little pools reflecting the sky and forming jewels in the landscape. If there is a good view outside of the cemetery to a distant hill, lake or river, or to a sunset, this view will, of course, be preserved.

In such a cemetery the stone monuments will be inconspicuous, but the cemetery as a whole will be a memorial park, a fitting monument for all buried within its enclosure where

"Nature forever consoling and kind; pours her wine and her oil on the smarts of the mind."

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 39th Annual Convention
Chicago, Illinois
August 24, 25, 26 and 27, 1925

The topic assigned for me today is "Memorials" and to cover fully that ground would require a more facile pen than mine and more time than I can hope to use. It can be treated in a broad scope, in a general way, such as relating to those of earlier times with their meanings, or it can be confined to a consideration of those of the present day with their environments and settings in cemeteries with which we come directly in contact.

From the earliest times, long before, as well as since the beginning of the Christian Era, there has been and still is a sentiment inherent in human hearts to perpetuate the memory and virtues of the departed by visible tokens of love and affection in the shape of memorials and so long as human love exists it will continue to manifest itself in various ways.

Whether it takes form in structures to commemorate the services of the great and events of time and place, or merely individual ones to mark the last resting places of loved ones. It is a sentiment that is not just individual, but is far-reaching, and nations do not forget those who have served and given their lives to preserve the liberties and ideals of their country, as evidenced by our own nation's dedicating national cemeteries that the deeds of its sons shall not perish from the earth, and the splendid structures already completed and now under construction upon the battlefields of Europe to mark the graves and perpetuate the services and memory of those who made the last supreme sacrifice in the recent war.

As to individual memorials of today and the recent past in our cemeteries, which we are more especially considering today, the older ones of us doubtless remember some of the earlier types formerly used, particularly in the smaller cemeteries. A very common one was the perpendicular slab of marble upon the face of which was inscribed in detail the lives and virtues of the deceased, with crude carvings and epitaphs of varied worth and meaning.

Happily, in the evolution which has taken place since then in the memorial industry, as well as in cemeteries in general, ideas have changed and today more beautiful productions, expressing distinctive beauty, correct proportions with classic architectural lines and symbolism expressive of memory and Christian belief, with hope of the future, have come into use.

It is unnecessary to go into an analysis here of the various types, such as sarcophagi, tablets and so forth, but let us view it in a broader sense and consider what a memorial might well consist of.

To my mind, it should be not just a monument, but the lot itself, with appropriate landscaping and whatever structures there may be upon it should be considered as a whole and the entire ensemble as a memorial which with nature's beauty combined with a man's handiwork will produce a sanctuary where recollections of sacred association bring comfort to the bereaved.

Both monument and lot can contribute to this and the monument itself need not be of great size, for that is not always essential to beauty and should be restricted in size commensurate to the area of the lot. A modest memorial can oftentimes express greater art than one more pretentious in bulk. Just an ordinary monument can be greatly enhanced in beauty by proper landscaping, while a memorial, beautiful in itself, can lose much if in an unsuitable environment.

As an example, a lofty shaft would lose much of its effectiveness if placed in a valley with high ground surrounding it; while a ledger lying flat would be lost if on a hill devoid of planting. But we might go further than the individual lot and consider the cemetery as a whole as a memorial expressing the spirituality, veneration and spirit of the living of that period and with its tokens of love and remembrance, combined with the works of nature, they may well be a sacred heritage for future generations.

This may appear to be fantastic—call it a dream if you will—but to me it seems very real and if it seems so to you, then you too are memorialists, even as we who work in stone and bronze.

In order to obtain these results, coordination of the efforts of both cemetery managements and those who furnish the memorials is most desirable and their interests being allied and in some respects identical, there should be cooperation rather than discord between them.

Every cemetery superintendent is undoubtedly animated by a sincere and laudable desire to have his cemetery a place of beauty and it is an absolute right that cemetery managers have to establish such rules, supervision and practices as may seem wise to them, but I wonder if, whether in eagerness to correct certain conditions, or perhaps without first having been given careful and thoughtful consideration, rules are not sometimes enacted that may defeat the very purpose which they are intended to perform.

Please do not think I am presuming to tell you how to conduct a cemetery, or what rules or practices to have and what I say is in the most friendly spirit, but if you can forget for a moment that I am a memorial dealer and consider me only as one who has been associated with cemeteries and a rather close observer for many years, you will more readily get my viewpoint.

I understand that a certain cemetery has a rule which goes into detail as to the sizes of monuments and provides for exact dimensions of various parts of them, stating that there must be a base, and of designated size, a die or superstructure of a certain size and that all monuments must be four feet in height. In such a case there is no chance for diversity of design and it would be impossible to use a cross symbolic of the Christian faith, a beautifully sculptured Stele showing the classic art of ancient Greece, a broken column suggestive of incompleted life or an obelisk pointing upwards to Heaven. Certainly such a rule cannot be conducive to produce a beautiful cemetery, but only one having a collection of chunks of stone that do not convey an expression of beauty or memory—one of the most sacred emotions that stirs the human heart.

I recently heard a cemetery superintendent, one who is a perfect gentleman and actuated by the highest motives and for whom I have great respect make a statement that he prohibited the use of a certain gray colored granite in a section of his cemetery. This must produce a cold, somber effect, greatly different from that which nature, the great teacher, provides in the beautiful and sometimes gorgeous colors shown in lavish abundance in the woodlands and it would seem as though a reasonable diversity of material in memorials, as well as in design, would enhance the beauty of a cemetery.

I have heard memorial dealers criticized rather harshly by the remark that "the monument men are making stone yards of cemeteries." Even if this were true, is it altogether their fault and where does the responsibility lie? We have our trouble with customers the same as you do with lot owners. Does not the practice which prevails in some cemeteries of platting lots of very small area have a great deal to do with it? When lots are limited in size to the extent that they are designated as two, four, or six grave lots with only sufficient space for burials and none for beautifying with shrubs, flowers, or open spaces, the monuments must necessarily be so close to each other and of a size so circumscribed that it inevitably causes congestion, which it would appear as though the memorial dealers are not responsible for.

These and other matters sometimes cause differences of opinion that create ill feeling which is most unfortunate and should not occur, and I sometimes think that perhaps in this, as well as other things in life, many of our difficulties arise because of a lack of understanding of the other fellow's problems.

This reminds me of an old legend which seems to me to be apropos to such a situation. It seems that there were two mountains with a valley between. The one was called the hill of suspicion, while the other was known as the mount of distrust. The earth on each was unproductive and baked with the sun of disappointment, while boulders of resentment lay scattered around with thorns and brambles of dislike in profusion and around the tops ever blew the cold winds of discord, while all the time, just below, lay the beautiful valley of understanding.

There the earth was fertile and gave forth crops in abundance. There the air was soft and balmy; the wooded spaces were vibrant with the melodious songs of thanksgiving and praise of their feathered denizens to their Creator, while down through the center a limpid river of contentment flowed quietly and serenely on to the sea.

One day it happened that the people living on the two hills met in the valley and as they realized the difference there from their usual places of abode, they resolved to move to the valley and thereafter their lives were full of peace, comfort and joy.

Let us hope that in some way those who have in charge the keeping of cemeteries and those who furnish memorials may in some way meet in the valley of understanding.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 45th Annual Convention
Kansas City, Missouri
September 21, 22, 23 and 24, 1931

About twelve or thirteen years ago a young man stood on a hilltop overlooking a small country cemetery of some fifty-five acres. This property had just been placed in his charge. He saw no buildings on the property. There was only a patch of lawn, with a few straggling headstones. Beyond the scant dozen acres of developed ground the hillside rose sere and brown. It was not exactly a scene of surpassing loveliness. The problem of making a notable property out of it was a serious one. It was apparent that its future commercially would not rise above its artistic and esthetic plane.

The young man who surveyed the scene, however, possessed one of those minds to which visions come. He was, as a matter of fact, a rare combination: In the highest sense an idealist, a dreamer of dreams; and at the same time, a practical, trained engineer, who could plan definitely how to make a worthy dream come true. On this historic occasion a dream did come—a vision. He saw, in one swift instant of revelation, what this tiny "God's Acre" might be made into. So real was this vision, so definitely did the philosophy by which it might be realized present itself to this practical man that that very day he put down in writing for his own private guidance, what you might call a Creed. It was a statement of his own beliefs and principles and theories.
And I think no better basis could be laid for the brief discussion which I shall attempt, than to read you this Builder's Creed—the self-instituted guide which was set up twelve years ago for Forest Lawn Memorial Park by Mr. Hubert Eaton: (which has been quoted in Mr. Eaton's address)

"This is the Builder's Dream; this is the Builder's Creed."

This was the vision. Now for the realization. It has only been achieved in part. Naturally, like the horizon, such a sweeping esthetic and spiritual concept must inevitably lift and carry the pilgrim on to bigger and better things beyond. But Forest Lawn Memorial-Park is today a property of about 200 acres. It is bounded on three sides by the everlasting hills, and protected equally from encroachment on the other by the natural situation and location.

Its employees number about 500. Its interments exceed in number those of any similar institution in the West. Its "Little Church of the Flowers," inspired by the historic church at Stoke Poges, England, to which immortality was given by the poet Gray, is the scene of hundreds of weddings each year. The Administration Building houses the executive offices, the well-patronized Flower Shop, a Museum of Antiquities. Its exterior architecture and interior decoration and arrangement are all authentically inspired by the mansion house of an English nobleman of the Sixteenth Century. Just being completed is a second church, "The Wee kirk o' the Heather," patterned after that famous little chapel in Dumfriesshire, Scotland, where Annie Laurie worshipped. The Mausoleum-Columbarium is a stately building of steel and concrete, built against the rock of the hillside in terraces, and upon the roof is now being placed a magnificent Court of Honor at one end of which will be placed a stained glass reproduction of Leonardo's "Last Supper." Surmounting Mount Forest Lawn a rugged Tower disguises its utilitarian purpose (the storage of water) by its allegorical conception and design and forms a landmark famous for miles around the property.

This is a quick sketch of Forest Lawn Memorial-Park as it has evolved since the Builder had his vision, a complete sketch except that I neglected to mention the scores of notable pieces of sculpture placed with great effectiveness about the grounds, or housed in the various buildings.
Now you might properly ask the question: Did advertising build all this? To answer it accurately would be as difficult as to answer the age old question: In the original creation, did the Egg or the Chicken come first? The fact is, the support of the public in the way of sales made possible the advertising, and the advertising helped to build the sales.
 
To most people there is something incongruous at first in the idea of a cemetery advertising far business. It is a common thing for us to be favored with "wise-cracks" and rather labored attempts at humor, when the subject comes up in ordinary conversation with the lay man. But we think we have discovered that Mr. Average Man’s heavy efforts at humor in connection with such a subject are what the psychologists call a "defense mechanism." Most people instinctively shrink from the thought or discussion of death. It seems like opening the door to morbid reflections. But it is also a fact that if death is faced courageously, accepted as a natural part of life, it begins to lose its power to terrify. Forest Lawn Memorial-Park holds boldly to the theory that a rational discussion of death and the problems which death creates for those left behind, rather than hastening one's end, operates in quite the opposite manner. We ask people to accept the unalterable fact of death, and to make wise, rational preparation for it, as they would for any other event of which they had certain foreknowledge.
 
Approaching the problem of selling a cemetery from this standpoint, the sales resistance is much more theoretical than real. It shrinks to a practical minimum indeed, when coupled with the utilitarian features of a cemetery property, you are fortunate enough to have esthetic, civic and artistic considerations on such a prodigal scale as happens to be the case with Forest Lawn.
 
Now of course what Forest Lawn is really doing is to create what is virtually a great composite memorial perpetuating not simply the memory of one individual but of all the brave souls who have gone on before us, from this community. Every owner of Forest Lawn property thus becomes a partner in this great enterprise. The fact that it has a commercial aspect in no way lessens its civic, esthetic and spiritual value to the community.
 
In fact, its commercial foundation is one of its outstanding virtues, because out of its sales is set up a perpetual fund for care and maintenance, which is a guarantee for all time to come that this area dedicated to a great purpose, shall forever remain dedicated to it, shall forever grow in grandeur and beauty, shall forever continue to evolve into a monument more and more fitting and adequate.

So this brings us to the practical problem of continuously making sales. These sales automatically group themselves, as you know, into the two classes: those made by natural exigency or "at need" and those made in advance or "before need".
 
Both classes of purchases are influenced tremendously by the good will or prestige of the institution. The sales force which is maintained devotes its efforts to the making of "before need" sales. Selections of this character naturally represent a greater volume in money than an equal number of "at need" sales.

I think I have sketched sufficiently the background of Forest Lawn to show you where advertising comes into the picture, to accomplish that which no other force could accomplish within the same time. May I remind you of an axiom very familiar to advertising men—that no business can succeed with advertising unless it would and could also succeed without it. I think that is generally true enough to set it down axiomatically. But what is implied in that axiom is this that advertising can be compared to the glassed houses of the florists, or the fertilizer and watering or the farmer, which renders success more certain and also encompasses it within reasonable time limits, as human lives and activities are measured. The "mouse trap" theory of Elbert Hubbard's, while it contains a considerable portion of truth, is yet dangerous in this modern day. Life is too short to wait for the world to beat a path to your door. If you have something worthy for the people, you must tell them if you want to sell them.

So it comes down to the question of telling. Who is going to do it? The Forest Lawn story—as I think I have sufficiently indicated—is no ordinary story. The average salesman will be able to do it but scant justice, even if the ordinary prospective buyer has the patience to listen or the intelligence to grasp quickly. Furthermore, if you have an important property, conducted on an ambitious a scale as Forest Lawn, you will not want to entrust its telling to the average sales force. If you have 50 people, you are bound to be creating at least fifty different versions of your story.

Forest Lawn boldly tells the public its story, in its own way. It uses for the purpose, practically every legitimate medium of advertising—radio, newspapers, billboards, theatre programs, direct advertising through the mail printed literature, and publicity.

Every character of Forest Lawn advertising goes through the same process of meticulous care in preparation: that is to say, no amount of time or pains is spared in the writing of copy, the preparation of art work, the arrangement of printing, so that precisely the right shade of meaning is conveyed, and so that the advertising shall always and everywhere be upon a very high literary, artistic and spiritual plane.

Radio has been found astonishingly effective in directing public attention upon the institution, and creating for it a most favorable association of ideas. A thirty-piece symphony orchestra and an ensemble of approximately sixteen singers of very high professional caliber are used one hour each week, together with a carefully written continuity. The programs are selected about two weeks in advance. Each program centers about one outstanding theme. The titles of some recent programs will give you an idea of this: Songs of the Sea—The Old Corner Book Shop—A Night in Havana—Russian Nights—A Night in the Theatres—"Chimes of Normandy"—Love Songs of the World—Evolution of the Dance—Wheels of the World—and Music of Devotion, which is the title of the Forest Lawn radio presentation to be given this Friday evening.

Practically all the music is rehearsed, and the entire program is approved by us before it is presented. The same hour and the same night each week are used, and since the advertising has now been running over the air for practically forty weeks, I think it is not too much to say that the Forest Lawn programs have become a recognized institution on the Pacific Coast. Emphasis is placed in the announcements on the cultural and esthetic features of Forest Lawn, the important works of art and notable buildings are repeatedly mentioned, and there is always an invitation to visit the Park as one of the best known places of interest in Southern California. Radio is one of the great new factors in advertising, but its technique is difficult and subtle, and offers the grandest opportunity of any medium open to the advertiser, for him to demonstrate how little he knows what the public wants. A certain well known national concern decided a few years ago to go on the air, and among their directors was a fine old gentleman who in his early youth had had it musical education. He volunteered—in fact, insisted—that he would take charge of the radio advertising. He searched the musical libraries of the new and old worlds for fine music which had never before been played. He announced that he was going to raise the standard of musical taste in America. After the company had spent hundreds of thousands of dollars it was unanimously agreed to abandon the idea of education. The fact is, that radio is a new and curious combination of art and showmanship and advertising. It is not absolutely necessary to be crazy to handle radio advertising, but you will get along better if you are!

Before we used the radio we used the newspapers, and in them presented the Forest Lawn story week after week. Copy and art were pitched upon a high plane. This newspaper advertising was widely read and commented upon. But when we began using radio we changed the character of the newspaper ads somewhat: that is, we now use the newspapers to advertise the radio programs. However, with each advertisement, there is also a straight Forest Lawn advertising message.

I think perhaps this would be as good as place as any for me to remark that the newspapers are much more effective since we have used the radio and the radio undoubtedly has a larger and more impressible audience because we use the newspapers. And this holds true of all our advertising, just as it holds true of advertising in any other field. When you use two mediums instead of one, you more than double your returns, because you increase the effectiveness of each one.

We use painted billboards, illuminated. Here we have only the briefest telegraphic message. Just now we are beginning the first of a series of symbolic messages. The one on the boards now is just a beautiful painting of the sea, no land or other objects in sight except clouds. Our copy reads "Eternal—as the sea." Then at the bottom of the board, FOREST LAWN MEMORIAL PARK IN GLENDALE. The next board no doubt will be just a painting of infinity, that is, a point far out in space, with the stars and planets suggested and again the phrase "Eternal—as the heavens." These boards are symbolical, suggestive, and carry the thought so necessary to get over, that Forest Lawn is an institution which shall endure for all time to come. Of course, there is a psychological association also, for it directs the mind, very subtly and without even appearing to do so, to the unalterable fact of earthly change but Eternal persistence of the human soul.

Though this discussion is not intended to be metaphysical or theological, we are not ashamed to say that Forest Lawn believes in eternal life, and we don't hesitate to say so in our advertising. We try to take the morbidity out of death, and the institution we advertise does not parade grief and woe and disconsolation, but typify and symbolizes in every way that ingenuity can suggest, abundant, endless and joyous life.

Right along this line, may I say that my company is at present  preparing a beautiful book which will probably be called "This Continuing Life" and in it will be quoted the best thought in prose and poetry of the whole world, bearing on immortality. The purpose of this book will be to serve as a courtesy or good will present, to patrons, without charge whatsoever, but as a subtle and delicately expressed gesture of understanding and sympathy with the bereaved. Surely it is not preaching to say that the surest and in fact, the only solace, which we can give to those left behind, is some concrete expression of our own conviction that their separation from their loved ones is out temporary.

So fast are precious objects of art from the old world being added to the already large collection in Forest Lawn, that we find it necessary quite frequently to reissue the official souvenir of the Park, called "The Chimes." This is a beautifully illustrated and printed booklet, in size 9" x 12", showing the latest and most attractive views of the grounds, buildings and statuary. As time goes on, The Chimes is growing further and further away from a commercial booklet, and tends to become more artistic and more truly a souvenir. This book is sold for a nominal price at the grounds, or is sent by mail in response to newspaper and other advertising.

Regular mailings of letter campaigns are maintained. We have tried to cover the "before need" sales story by letter but just now we are using a very short letter, with which is enclosed a simply written booklet with the sales story.

We have another booklet, called prosaically, "The Truth. About Burial Customs and Costs," and our advertising is keyed for this booklet also, which is distributed gratis. It is a plain story of the': subject, as its title indicates.

Still another booklet, which is growing more and more important as time goes on, is the Official Guide Book. This is practically a cyclopedia of all the interesting features of Forest Lawn, describing in detail the grounds, buildings, statuary and other objects of special significance, interest, or historical association. This booklet, on thin Bible stock, is in great demand by visitors.

The use of theatre programs for cemetery advertising may seem incongruous, but our experience and observation is that this is a most valuable medium. It reaches a good class of people, it profits by the very fact that it is different from any other advertising in the program, and we know from actual tests made in the theatres, that it is read perhaps more thoroughly than even our newspaper insertions.

We are fairly generous patrons of some of the higher types of class publications, such as women's clubs magazines, musical publications, etc., going to special groups. When we do use these mediums, we exercise exactly the same care in preparation that we would if we were going into the Ladies Home Journal or Vanity Fair.

Then of course, we attempt to secure all the publicity to which we are entitled by virtue of the news value of the events which occur in which Forest Lawn figures. The acquisition of new statuary or buildings makes legitimate news. At Easter Time a sunrise service is held on Mount Forest Lawn attended last year by 40,000 to 50,000 people. The Little Church of the Flowers attracts many notable weddings, which are the basis of legitimate publicity.

I should not be surprised if some of you are mentally asking the question: which advertising, medium is most profitable. I have always tried to live up to the legend that an advertising man is omniscient, but in this case I will imperil my reputation, if any, by saying that I do not know. I think I am safe in saying that, taken all together, they are profitable. My recommendation to any cemetery is that if they are using practically all media, and the sum total of results is pretty satisfactory, leave well enough alone. It is entirely probable that some of those media are pulling only 50 percent, some 90 percent, some 100 percent, and maybe others 200 percent. If it was my money I wouldn't care. I have seen too many instances where it was attempted to get exactly 100 percent out of each and every cog in the wheel. Don't look for perfection in every piece of advertising, any more than you do in every individual in a given group. We ought to be happy if the general level of the group is pretty high, in a world which is still able only to approximate perfection in any line of effort.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 43rd Annual Convention
Los Angeles, CA
September 3, 4, 5 and 6, 1929

The men present today represent two of the oldest practices known to mankind—burial and cremation. Those of you who are especially interested in the history of your craft can find many remarkable examples of both methods. I need not recount them to you. The pyramids, Taj Mahal, cave burial—all these have their own connotation.

Cremation has been traced to the early Aryans, from whom all white men have descended. And, probably, most of you know that the word "Aryan" means "the race that moves onward and upward."

The speaker has looked up the history of cremation and found evidence from the earliest periods. Ancient India cremated. Many early Indian tribes, the earliest Scandinavians, Huns, Greeks, Anglo-Saxons, Franks, Lombards and Israelites. Saul, the first king of Israel, together with his three sons was cremated after the battle with the Philistines at Mount Gilboa, 990 BC: "All the valiant men arose, and went all night, and took the body of Saul and the bodies of his sons from the wall of Bethshan, and came to Jabesh and burnt them there." And the beloved Buddha was cremated, his ashes divided into 7 parts and 7 sacred temples erected in as many different widely separated locations.

The first cremation of the white race in the United States, of which we find record, is that of Colonel William Henry Laurens, member of George Washington's staff, who was cremated in Charleston, South Carolina, in 1792, in accordance with his wishes. Two weeks later, another member of George Washington's staff died, and was likewise cremated upon a burial pyre in a beautiful garden.

So far as we can discover, the first crematory was built by Dr. Julius Lemoyne in Washington, Pennsylvania, in 1876. The first person cremated in this crematorium was Baron LePalm, in the same year. (Dr. Lemoyne had built this crematorium for the cremation of his own body—he was so strongly averse to burial.) The popular disapproval of this innovation was so active that police reserves were called out in New York City to allow the departure of the body. The furnace was the old fashioned coke, preheated type, 24 hours to heat, 2 hours to cremate and another 24 hours to cool. A tablet in memory of this beginning of the modern cremation movement has been placed on this little brick crematory by the Cremation Association of America by Dr. Hugo Erichsen, its founder.

The public crematorium movement was really started by the sons of Dr. Corey of Buffalo, New York. Dr. Corey, somewhere about the early eighties, died in Europe and was cremated in an Italian crematorium. His sons, upon return to Buffalo, decided to organize the Buffalo Crematorium for public use. They brought the Italian workmen and materials from Europe and installed a wood alcohol, gas producing and burning retort, which was used intermittently with gas supply to date. Of the various systems of cremation more later.
Perhaps, you will be interested in a few brief statistics of the cremation movement in this and other countries. In Scandinavia, there were 2,757 cremations in 1927 and in 1928 there were 3,207. Germany, much better organized had 48,369 cremations in 1928 and a total of 437,591 cremations since 1892. Czech Slovakia has swung into the cremation movement since the war and with the modest beginning of 83 cremations in 1918 they have recorded 4,090 in 1928. It is very interesting to note that the number of cremations by religion are kept over there, 50% of the cremations were Roman Catholic and 8% Protestant. Mussolini has disapproved of cremation in Italy, although there are 2 score crematories, you know that anything of which Mussolini disapproves dies of anemia.

Now in the United States, as you will see by the report, of the statistical committee of the Cremation Association, the growth of cremation has been constant. The four-year period, ending in 1928, shows 101,467. Partial report.

Now, as to methods used. The earliest crematoriums all followed one general method. With coal or coke or wood, they heated a chamber to incandescence, then introduced the body, either in casket or on a slab, and reduced it to its mineral elements by radiant heat. The principle exterior evidences of this system were a very high stack, lots of smoke, delivery of tons or cords of fuel. The interior evidences were the sound of shoveling, the roar of burning and blowers and the white-heated furnace. One had to be a 100% cremationist in those days to face all of these horrors.

With the discovery of crude oil for industrial purposes, some one proposed the possibility of cremation by oil fire. With tremendous heat available at short notice, this permitted the cremation of bodies which were placed in an unheated furnace. The earliest furnaces for this purpose were, I think, those originated by the superintendent of Cypress Lawn Cemetery, San Francisco—Mr. Davidson. He got up a tremendous pressure of either steam or air and fired oil flame directly upon the body. Yes, it would cremate the body, but with most unpleasant circumstances. This system was carried to the Hawaiian Islands, to Sacramento, Seattle and other places. And, speaking from the standpoint of one who is devoted to the cause of cremation, I am compelled to say that it had nothing to recommend it, except economy. The same high stack was required and there was more smoke, more noise and worse yet, pieces of cloth from the casket and clothing floated lightly out of the smoke stack and spread over the landscape.

I am not sure who started the gas cremation, but I think this was Frank Gibson, who used artificial gas, firing on the body directly and carrying the fumes and smoke to a separate chamber to be further consumed. The gas had the virtue of making less noise and less smoke, but the fuel cost, even with the most modern apparatus, runs from $2.50 to $8 per case. The roar is still there.

Electrical cremation was tried by surrounding the casket chamber inside with resistance metal. Mechanical difficulties developed and this was abandoned 15 years ago, only to be tried again in southern California, and again abandoned by one new plant, because of its cost, the duration of the process, the smoke and odor from incomplete combustion.

I have studied this whole situation many years and have decided that the ideal system would be somewhat as follows:—there should be no stack or at best, a very low one, there should be no noise, the furnace should not be preheated, the casket and body should be placed in the furnace without dismantling of any sort. There should be no smoke and no firing directly on the body. All this has been accomplished as you will see in California—at Fresno, San Bernardino, Oakland, Long Beach.

So much for methods. Any paragraph of this could be expended into an hour's discussion. In the early days of cremation, the sanitary appeal was made. The protection for water supplies, the evidence of decomposition either in the ground or in mausoleums. These emphases have been almost wholly abandoned. The cremationists are following the modern trend and the accent is now on the aesthetic element. If you will study the records of the different crematoriums, you will find that it is those which are beautiful, which minister to a sense of peace, which are making the greatest gains.

And right here, let me speak about your own craft as cemetery men, a little while,—so far as I have investigated the matter, there has been no propaganda in favor of earth burial. Cemeteries have not made advance to meet the competition of the modern crematorium and mausoleum. The average cemetery office is a dull place with musty records and old fashioned procedure, whereas the average mausoleum or crematorium has become the place of light, cheer and beauty.

I want you cemetery men to realize that the real competition is not between the cemetery, crematorium and mausoleum—the real competition is for the consumer's dollar, between the mortuary craft and the other crafts. Americans, particularly, have surplus money to spend for luxuries, so called and the real problem of the 3 phases of our mortuary craft is to so elevate in the minds of the public the appreciation of the memorials, that they will establish beautiful places of memory. The time has gone by, when the cemetery men should depreciate the value of what the crematory man has to offer and the converse. To put it in the language of the theatre—the people really decide on the following typical formula: "Shall we have a burial lot, a new Buick, or a baby?" What form of happiness shall we invest in?

To survive in the modern competition where the genius of the artist, and the artisan and engineer, the architect, the real estate salesman is manifested in a million tempting ways, the mortuary craft must do likewise, for after all, the most prosperous craft will be that which makes the most compelling appeal. Ugliness is on the way out, drudgery is obsolete and a new era of beauty in all things has come.

Let any man here go home to his work and ask himself this question, looking it fairly in the face:—"Is my place early Victorian, or earlier than that? Do people come to me only when they have to, or do they love to come, because of what I have to offer in ministry?" Just as the old grocery with its spilled sugar and salt, its dripping kerosene can its barrel of vinegar, has gone out, just so the musty cemetery vault, the dull and dank chapel, the ancient office and the ancient attitude are a thing of the past.

Contrary to the general opinion, the gross and net returns for each cremation case are greater than for every burial. This result is only attained, however; by having everything modern in crematorium, columbarium and urn displays. You will also be interested in knowing that in some eastern cemeteries, notably Mt. Auburn in Boston, organized in 1839, there are more cremations than burials.

I know that every man here wants to be a master in his work and maybe, in these few moments left me, I can give some suggestions of what we can do. First of all, it is proper to say that a first class cemetery or crematorium man has an opportunity to express his finest quality of mind and heart. He must be more things to more people than he perhaps realizes. In forestry, horticulture, civil engineering, architecture, accounting, human contacting and in those fine, high spiritual qualities of leadership which lift his craft above the crowd, the cemetery man has a life time task. Cemeteries, mausoleums, columbarium should be full of the meanings of joy, of "beginning again"; of symbols of faith, of transforming by renewing of mind. Tall or thin, dark or light, Jewish, Christian, foreign or native, you yourself can stand above the crowd by developing your attribute of service to a higher degree; join American aristocracy of service.

But I think that if one would search for a single phrase in which one could concentrate all qualities and all capacities needed, it would be that—that the mortuary craft should be regarded as a ministry, in its highest and most noble sense. This, then, means that whether you operate a nonprofit or commercial institution, the ministry of beauty shall enter in every possible appeal—in the sound of music, of falling water and of songs of birds; in beauty of form, whether of landscaping or architecture, arrangement of road or path, in shape of urn; in spire and tower, in light. In the ministry of finance, wherein devoted men would endow and perpetuate these abodes of memory and in the ministry of love through service of personal understanding and sympathy.

May I, in closing, outline to you the ideal crematorium and columbarium? In outward appearance—of charming dignity, and preferably, church-like buildings (with no stack nor exterior evidence of cremation, either of sound or odor visible) in which one would love to enter, the chapel bright with the cheer of not only its form, but also its color, the song of birds, the music of beautiful organs. A Memorial columbarium should have no dark corners in it. Indoor gardens will lift it from the common place; the niches themselves should be very substantial, the urns well selected as to form and inscription, the walls adorned with messages of cheer from the Scriptures and poets; sunshine should enter, fountains add their note, and where possible, gardens should open to the outdoors. Our own California Crematorium, in Oakland, has huge glass and steel rolling skylights, which roll back allowing the sun and fresh air to enter.

But all this is just material. In addition, there should be a staff of conscientious, high-minded employees, who are devoted to the establishment and maintenance of a beautiful memorial.

Of course, behind all this, there shall be records accurately kept, funds administered with integrity, and a devotion to the things of the spirit.

And now, curiously, I shall place my text last, and it is this—taken from Cicero:—Memory is the treasurer and guardian of all things." For of our dead it has been said"

They have but put off their shoes,
Softly to walk by day within our thoughts,
To tread, at night,
Our dreamed paths of sleep.

They are not dead who live in hearts they leave behind,
In those whom they have blest they live again,
And shall have eternal life. And grow each day more beautiful as time declares their good,
Forgets the rest and proves their immortality.

Therefore I have fulfilled my appointment to speak of cremation and crematories by saying that cremation and niche interment now called inurnment, is one of three ways to memorialize the dead and foster in lives and hearts of men and women, memories which are the treasures and guardian of all things.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 43rd Annual Convention
Los Angeles, CA
September 3, 4, 5 and 6, 1929

We, who are students of art and design and the application of their beauty to life and living, believe that the day of the cemetery as a place for the glorification of sorrow is gone forever.

Is not death, in fact, but an incident of living?

America—particularly on her Western Coast so full of new opportunities, is showing to the world that a place of burial can be, even has a mission to be—a field of beauty, of restfulness, and of comfort, both physical and spiritual.

On a recent study tour of Europe, the speaker was shocked by the gloom, the lugubriousness, of every famous cemetery. Outstanding features are arches draped in black, slimy pools, statues of weeping women, figures of tragedy, trees all deciduous, generally weeping, or dark evergreens of the saddest type.

No less gloomy are many burying grounds of older America. Why, there are still sections of this country where it would be considered sacrilege to send any flowers but dead white to a funeral. Many a man has stayed away from a burial for lack of dead black suit.

On the other hand there was buried the other day, in the old Episcopal cemetery under the Pepper Trees at San Gabriel, a dear little old lady who had spent her life in deeds of love for others. She had smilingly announced that when she was planted she wanted bright red roses on her grave; and bright red roses there were from her friends, piled up by the thousand, to celebrate her joy in going to an easier life.

Consider the famous and beautiful forested cemetery at Marshalltown, Iowa, where the young people go for their outings, in the one great beauty spot of the region.

Consider "Graceland" at Chicago, where one wanders far along tranquil lakes and strolls through masses of flowering shrubs before catching even a glimpse of a tombstone.

Consider "Forest Lawn Memorial Park" on the edge of Los Angeles, where whole hillsides are being planted to the gayest semi-tropic flowering trees of every color, and where the American Legion section is landscaped in trees and shrubs to bloom in patriotic masses of red, white and blue flowers.

Go back a hundred years, and consider the exquisite walled garden of the Old Mission of Santa Barbara, with its riot of color and its music of mocking birds; and see how for ahead of us those brave old Padres learned the lesson of beauty, when you find that that old garden was then, and still is, but a cemetery for the burial of priests and friars.

It is life that a cemetery should show, life and the joy of life, and the sweetness of passing to a new life. Sorrow is only for those who are left behind; so let the resting place of their dear ones, I say, be a bright scene to ease that sorrow and to hasten its passing.

Let there, then, be happy trees in the cemeteries, trees of glossy foliage and brilliant inflorescence; gay shrubbery, evergreen as far as the region and climate will allow, flowers in abundance, of every color; sparkling waters, running, if possible; statues that depict life and hope and love, not sorrow; live pigeons, white and colored, in the air; bright water fowls upon the pools; peacocks (with vocal organs painlessly removed) strutting upon the lawns.

Thus will the joy of life be increased, thus will the sting of the loss of loved ones be softened and comforted.

Only then will the Cemetery fill its brightest mission.
 

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 43rd Annual Convention
Los Angeles, CA
September 3, 4, 5 and 6, 1929

The subject "Creation of a Modern Park Cemetery" would necessitate a theoretical discourse—the "Creation of Forest Lawn" is an actual experience from which you may acquire some practical benefit.

My first glimpse of Forest Lawn Cemetery showed it to be a little country cemetery, of ten acres developed, forty-five undeveloped; with no buildings, no improvements, with the exception of a grove of olive trees and a few scattering headstones. Such a picture most of you have seen many times. Forest Lawn's other assets were a total of 1400 interments, and yearly gross sales of $28,000.

Today, twelve years after we took charge, Forest Lawn Cemetery is Forest Lawn Memorial Park—Park it is, because the visitor rarely recognizes that he is entering into a so-called "cemetery". Forest Lawn now comprises over 200 acres, with a total of 28,464 interments, sales amounting to more than one million dollars per year, and total assets aggregating ten million dollars. It averages 300 interments per month, and 81 weddings per month. Our payroll of yesterday showed an organization of 406 employees, including an Architectural Department of 12 Architects and an Engineering force of like number.

Today it possesses many buildings of historical and architectural charm that house some of the world's greatest art treasures, and last year more than 525,000 visitors passed through her gates. Forest Lawn is not only a safe depository for our beloved dead, but also a place for the living to visit and sacredly enjoy. The manner in which these results have been arrived at are briefly as follows:

My first move twelve years ago when I awoke to find myself in charge of Forest Lawn Cemetery, was to personally visit the great interment places of the world. I talked to Superintendents, Grave Diggers, Presidents, and Undertakers. I wanted to find out why a African-American whistled when he went through a cemetery; I wanted to find out why most of the interment spots in the United States were places to be shunned—looked upon as civic liabilities where they should have been civic assets. I wanted to find out why even the most beautiful cemeteries were visited by people mainly from a sense of duty; why most of them were so ugly, and why they didn't have architects and landscape engineers connected with them. I wanted to find out if the cemeteries were wrong or if it was the people. And then when I had finished with the cemeteries, I visited public parks, glimpsed their lovely vistas, watched their fountains at play, admired their beautiful statuary and studied their architectural buildings. I strolled through museums and galleries of art; I questioned people who had traveled in the art centers of the Old World—and then I came home. I had found my answer.

BUILDER’S CREED

I have always found if I put my thoughts into writing the very act seems to clarify my mind and enables me to approach a problem in a logical manner. And so, on New Year's Day, 1917 I sat down and wrote what I termed "The Builder's Creed", and if I were called upon today to give you my recipe for the "Creation of a Modern Park Cemetery", the best I could do would be to hand you this Creed:

"I believe in a happy Eternal Life. I believe that those of us left behind should be glad in the certain belief that those gone before have entered into that happier life. I believe, most of all, in a Christ that smiles and loves you and me. I therefore know the cemeteries of today are wrong because they depict an end, not a beginning. They have consequently become unsightly stone yards, full of inartistic symbols and depressing customs, places that do nothing for humanity save a practical act and that not well.

"I therefore prayerfully resolve on this New Year's Day, 1917, that, I shall endeavor to build Forest Lawn as different as unlike other cemeteries as sunshine is unlike darkness, as Eternal Life is unlike Death. I shall try to build at Forest Lawn a great Park, devoid of misshapen monuments and other customary signs of earthly death, but filled with towering trees, sweeping lawns, splashing fountains, singing birds, beautiful statuary, cheerful flowers, noble memorial architecture, with interiors full of light and color, and redolent of the world's best history and romances. I believe these things educate and uplift a community.

"Forest Lawn shall become a place where lovers new and old shall love to stroll and watch the sunset's glow, planning for the future or reminiscing of the past; a place where artists study and sketch; where school teachers bring happy children to see the things they read of in books; where little churches invite, triumphant in the knowledge that from their pulpits only words of love can be spoken, where memorialization of loved ones in sculptured marble and pictorial glass shall be encouraged but controlled by acknowledged artists; a place where the sorrowing will be soothed and strengthened because it will be God's Garden. A place that shall be protected by an immense Perpetual Care Fund, the principal of which can never be expended—only the income there from used to care for and perpetuate this Garden of Memory. This is the Builder's Dream; this is the Builder's Creed."

That Creed has never been changed from that day to this and at Forest Lawn it has been not only our aesthetic guide but it has been the practical, every day rule upon which all our development and operation has been based.

Let me tell you of a few of the milestones that we passed in our endeavor to carry out this Creed.

Our financial set-up included two corporations—one, a corporation which owned the land and was the usual form of Business Corporation with stockholders who invested their money with the hopes of making profit. The other corporation, called Forest Lawn Cemetery Association, was a mutual association with no stockholders, comprised of lot owners and so constituted that any profits it might make must be expended back upon the cemetery and could not be distributed for the benefit of any individual. The Land Company made a contract with the Association to sell the Association its land and the purchase price was determined by a fifty-fifty division of whatever amount the Association should receive from the public for its lots. The Association thus purchased from the Land Company real estate as it would have purchased it from any other corporation or landowner. The Association then took these lands and manufactured them into a cemetery product.

Financing, efficiency and organization have always been the subjects that we at Forest Lawn give the most Attention. We know if the finances and sales are not forthcoming, the plans that we hold so dear to our hearts cannot be carried out. Forest Lawn had no money; therefore we next turned our attention to a Sales Force.

The Sales Force was divided into two groups: A salaried force for selling our products for immediate use to the purchaser who had a death in his family; the other group sold our product before need and their remuneration was based entirely on commission.

This "Before Need” was the first organization west of the Mississippi to sell cemetery lands in this manner—a method that had been tried in but two other places in the world before. Sales forces are needed, but they can be either a great blessing or a great abomination. I could talk to you for hours on our experience with sales forces, but time does not permit. In passing, let me urge this one word of caution out of our experience. That Sales Force is wrong whose whole theory of salesmanship is based upon price, money, buy cheap today and make a profit tomorrow. The best and highest type of salesmen in this business never mention these subjects—he deals only with the moral factors involved, such as insurance, duty, protection to the family, approaching the matter in the same light as one draws his will.
 
We next laid plans for development. We immediately saw the wisdom of merging together all forms of burial—namely, cremation, mausoleum, and cemetery under one management and one ownership. This, I believe, was the first time this had been done in the United States. The amalgamation of three overheads meant not only financial efficiency but again gave to the purchaser a great service. A family could disagree upon the various forms of burial each one desired and yet in Forest Lawn we offered to them the prospect of finally being gathered together in one spot.

"Beauty" was the yardstick by which we measured equally the physical development of our grounds and buildings the requests of the purchaser that something special be done on his lot or his crypt, or the Engineer's and Architect's plans and specifications. We realized that Forest Lawn must be developed as a whole. No longer must the individual be allowed to do anything in regard to his interment space.

I adopted three slogans:
1.    We shall depict LIFE, not Death.
2.    A safe depository for our beloved dead and also a place for the living to sacredly enjoy.
3.    Spend one dollar in construction today to save one cent in future care tomorrow.

We also changed the method of computing Perpetual Care in terms of a percentage of the purchase price, to that method of setting so much aside per square foot of land area to be taken care of regardless of purchase price received.

Our next step was to revise the rules, regulations and restrictions. Here we encountered the greatest obstacle of all. Precedent is one of the hardest things there is to combat in the human mind. The older we grow the less do we like changes; the more we like to do as was done before. The public looks with suspicion upon radical changes in interment places.

We had early determined that it was monuments that had turned cemeteries into stone yards. I could find nothing beautiful in ninety nine percent of the so-called "monuments" placed in the cemeteries of America. They rendered a Park plan impossible. We first offered the purchaser a ten percent discount if he would accept a deed without a monumental privilege extending above the surface of the lawn. I then called together the prominent monument dealers and reasoned with them. I suggested that in the main they were creating objects of ugliness. I requested that they cooperate with me in endeavoring to create only memorials of beauty. I left that meeting discouraged because it seemed to me there was not one of them on speaking terms with "beauty." A year later, Forest Lawn took the bull by the horns and forever eradicated the so-called "monument." Then they took me to the Grand Jury. "Restraint of trade" was the charge. Have you ever walked into the Grand Jury room as a possible defendant? I explained and the Jury laughed away my fears.

Then we underwent that experience, awful to any cemetery man, viz., of seeing would be purchaser turn and leave Forest Lawn without purchasing, because they could not have a monument. It took nerve to "Stand by the guns" in those days—particularly when we were sailing an unchartered sea. I held firm, however, in the belief that the Five Dollar gold piece was obscured by the Silver Dollar close to our eye and too, one must be true to one's Creed. Soon the tide turned. The public began to see the picture we were striving to create and today, the only requests we have for monuments are when the purchaser desires to spend sufficient money to create a real work of art.

Through the years we gradually affected other reforms. I list a few of them:

We banned artificial flowers.

Nothing in front of or on mausoleum crypts except those bronze vases and crypt memorials designed by and furnished by the Association.

(I wonder why it is that people always go to their attic when they desire to take something to a cemetery or a mausoleum I have seen mausoleum shelves that look like a bottle factory on a spree.)

No memorial decoration whatsoever placed without the approval of the Association.

The Association does all planting.

Markers at graves restricted to bronze only—more lasting and more artistic; lawnmowers do not chip.

No coping or any form of enclosure allowed to mark the lines of any lot or grave.

Memorials in mausoleum either bronze or Carrara marble—other metals and Alabaster prohibited.

No cut-in letters permitted on crypts except in first unit of mausoleum.

All burials in Forest Lawn must be made in concrete boxes, the reason being that wood boxes cave in, leaving an unsightly greensward and add appreciably to care.

We pictured LIFE, not Death. We carefully eradicated the old familiar signs of death. We substituted the winged-doves, swimming ducks, singing birds, splashing fountains—everything symbolical of LIFE. We eradicated even the trees that lose their leaves in the winter time suggesting death. And thus restriction upon restriction we piled up but always that restriction was based upon the good of all, even though it hurt the individual, and always based upon the best professional artistic judgment we could get.

Our first building was inspired by the Architect's visit to that little church at Stoke Poges where the poet Gray wrote his immortal "Elegy, written in a Country Churchyard." In keeping with our resolution to depict LIFE and not Death, we added, adjacent to the pews, conservatories filled with flowers and singing birds. Over the chancel we wrote this inscription: "A New Commandment I give unto you, that ye' love one another." This church was properly dedicated with all due solemnity and ceremony and then, like any other church it was thrown open for sermons, funerals, weddings, christenings, etc. We called this church "The Little Church of the Flowers" and it has become so popular that today we are just finishing another, to be dedicated as the "Wee Kirk o' the Heather." It is an exact reconstruction of Annie Laurie's church at Glencairn, Scotland, which lies in ruins.

Our Mausoleum has been built in units, conforming to a general plan. We estimate the general building will take about fifteen years more to complete, at a total cost of approximately Twenty-five Millions of Dollars. Four units have been completed and sold. The fifth is now under construction and will contain the great Memorial Court of Honor wherein "The Last Supper" window will be placed. These units have been built as sales progressed. Gross sales in the Mausoleum, to date, have amounted to approximately three millions of dollars. Here again we planned to eradicate gloom and depression substituting cheer, bright colors, depicting galleries of art rather than halls of death, always bearing in mind our slogan of "A safe depository for our beloved dead, but also a place for the living to sacredly enjoy." I touch the physical description only briefly because I understand you are later to visit Forest Lawn.

I shall never forget my first purchase of statuary. It was Edith Parson's "Duck Baby," made famous by Robinson's poem at the San Francisco Fair. I suggested to the Board that they authorize me to make this purchase. I immediately saw that the appropriation would not pass the Boards, so I adjourned the meeting without putting the matter to a vote. A week later I purchased the statue on my own authority as General Manager. A short time ago we placed in Forest Lawn the great "Mystery of Life" statue, comprising some twenty two life size figures, the site of which occupies 3,576 square feet, at a cost of approximately sixty-seven thousand dollars. That appropriation passed the Board without a dissenting vote and many expressions of enthusiastic approval. Such was the difference between the old attitude and the new. The same men, the same Board but with a different view point.

In 1923 I started by biennial trips to Europe, with the intention of studying at close range the art and architecture of those places acknowledged by the world, without debate, to be "beautiful." Every other year I have gone abroad, bringing back to Forest Lawn bigger and better things as my experience became qualified and Forest Lawn's progress became more assured. I could talk to you for hours telling you of antique furniture, old tapestries, the sword of Charles the First, Michelangelo's "Moses", "The Last Supper", in art glass, Fanfani's "Mother Love," Canova's "Three Graces" adinfinitum.

If you desire, go see these things for yourself. Be sure to tell my boys to give you a Guide Book, (we finally had to issue one, explaining approximately 165 works of art—educational, inspiring, and replete with the world's best historical romances. Who ever heard of a cemetery having a Guide Book? Who ever heard of a cemetery that, during the month of June, had to close its book of wedding reservations at 165 because there were no more hours left? I hear someone say—"Weddings are good advertising". If you stop there you miss the very point I am trying to illustrate. It means that the attitude of people is changing towards our interment places. Instinctive in every human heart is a desire and a reaching out for the beautiful things of life. Give the public "beauty" and it will respond a hundred fold.

We already have museum rooms at Forest Lawn. I hope the day will come when we shall have a Forest Lawn Academy of Fine Arts, free to the worthy youth of the Pacific Coast. I hope to persuade sufficient people in this Southland to provide in their wills endowments, whereby the Honor man in the graduating class in this institution or arts may be given three years abroad, with expenses paid. An ambitious program, yes, but I believe basically correct and no more difficult of accomplishment than the ones we laid in 1917, a great many of which have come to pass.

Ladies and gentlemen—this brings me to my last topic—the Memorial Idea. All the figures and facts that I have heretofore quoted have been made with the hope of convincing you that the statements I shall now make are not merely theoretical assumptions but facts born of hard experiences in the interment field. I fancy I see u smile come over the faces of the Californians in this audience, because they have heard me speak on the Memorial Idea before. I am sorry, because I fear they will be bored, for I shall say nothing new—I shall not even attempt a newness because the more familiar I can make this subject to them and to you the more surely can I drive home the intense conviction that I have.

The memorial instinct is one of the oldest and greatest in man. It is this instinct that, moving in practical ways, has created the great art and architectural triumphs of the ages. Few people realize that it was the memorial idea that gave to the world the Pyramids, the Taj Mahal, which is acknowledged to be the most beautiful building in the world. Westminster Abbey, the Partheon, the Castel Saint Angelo and practically all of the enduring works of architecture and art that succeeding generations have journeyed around the world to see and admire.

Mr. Will Durant, author of that book "The Mansions of Philosophy" which is being so generally read just now, pays a remarkable tribute to the influence which the memorialization idea has played in art and architecture. He says:

"Architecture began with tombs that housed the dead; the most ancient architectural monuments in the world—the Pyramids—are tombs. Churches began as shrines to the dead and places for worshipping them. Gradually the burial place was taken out into the neighboring ground, but still, in Westminster Abbey, the graves of great ancestors are within the church. From these beginnings came the proud temples raised by the Greeks to Pallas, Athene, and the other gods; and from similar beginnings came those fairest works ever reared by man, the Gothic cathedrals, whose altars, like those early tombs, harbor the relics of the holy dead."

All of our history books, our literature and much of our daily living, is derived from the efforts of the past ages to leave a record of themselves in memorials. Everything passes except that generated by this Memorial Idea. Its spiritual significance defends it against encroachments of a material age, and the cemetery, mausoleum, or crematory that plans such development upon this foundation can rest assured that coming generations will approve. If you hold strongly to the spiritual thought which inspires it, if you but carry the message by the dignity of form and proportion, the refinement of color and detail, by the beauty of the whole, present generations will reward you and future generations admire and preserve.

Do not fall into the error of believing that the average cemetery official can create beauty. I seriously doubt if there is a man in this room capable of truly evidencing the Memorial Idea in form and color. If any of you have that capacity then you have combined in you the qualities of a great architect, a great artist, a great landscape engineer and a great sculptor, because these attainments are needed. You will find that in the long run it will be cheaper to hire those men acknowledged to be "Great" in these lines and to whom God, at birth, gave the power to create beautiful things.

If you plan artistically correct in the beginning you will find that in the end you save money. Look at Paris with its Champs Elysees and intersecting streets, planned by a great architect long before the automobile came into existence. Correct planning meant broad avenues which automatically took care of automobile congestion, whereas today we, in our cities, are spending millions to change these narrow streets.

The financial welfare of every man in this room is dependent upon the elevation of the Memorial Idea, to encourage it is obvious—to degrade it is suicide, and yet that very thing we do every day.

THE CEMETERY MAN, who allows an ugly thing placed or developed within the confines of his grounds, or by word of mouth divests if of its spiritual significance, is helping to destroy the Memorial Idea.

THE MAUSOLEUM BUILDER, who allows any material or form of design to go into his building except that acknowledged by the technical world to be the most lasting and the most beautiful, writes his own epitaph.

THE CREMATION MAN who stops with the ashes (incinerated remains) in his hands, and fails to insist that his client create a memorial for those remains, evidenced by an urn and a niche, or solemn committal to a grave or mausoleum, will, in time, like Samson, pull the house down upon us and himself. God hasten the day when the crematories will take their stand and say "No more incineration without the creation of a memorial—we define the word 'cremation' as including incineration, inurnment and permanent deposition—the three actions are inseparable and indivisible."

THE UNDERTAKER who impresses his clients with the feeling that his portion of attending to the death is the most important, that he is, to all practical purposes the end of the transaction (where the Memorial Idea demands that he be but the entrance door to the Memorial Temple), that Undertaker is the greatest fool of all. His is the greatest opportunity because his clients are in a plastic state, ready to be tuned to the highest call of the Memorial Idea, or molded with a commercial, materialistic, get-it-over form of thought, which results in nothing of lasting benefit to society of his family.

How long—how long will the Interment Association endure the degradation of the Memorial Idea by certain low caliber Funeral Directors? I know of many Funeral Directors who are high class, intelligent, sympathetic and in tune with the Memorial Idea, but I am informed that there are many others whose efforts tend to lower the ethical standards so strived at by the Association of Funeral Directors.

God forbid that I shall be compelled to enter the undertaking business, but I solemnly prophecy this: That the Memorial Park of tomorrow will demand sweeping reforms on the part of the undertaking craft or Memorial Parks will build and develop undertaking establishments of their own. I prophecy, because the end is obvious—it is economically correct. In any other business these consolidations would .have been effected long ago. Service to the public of the future will demand an undertaking establishment in every cemetery—in every mausoleum—in every crematory, where the sorrowing purchaser may go and transact all of his interment preparations at one time with one concern and one individual, in a place where he, his family and friends at the time of the funeral may park their automobiles in grounds where roads provide ample parking area and amidst surroundings of beauty and quiet which soothe and comfort their sorrow. The public of the future will demand that this consolidation be effected to save them the high cost of burying. Then, and not till then, will the Memorial Idea be in position to be brought to its highest fruition.

Let you and me resolve to go back to our various institutions and "play the game", resolved to stand staunch and true to the Memorial Idea; resolved that when we are distracted by the barrage of requests from unthinking owners to allow this or that improvement to their interment space, to stand fast and "play the game."

I have known a few business men who consistently have fought a victorious fight, but I think most of us, with all our good intentions fall back boot by boot until at last, for some reason, we stiffen and hold our own. Hold fast to this Memorial Idea—it will make you free spiritually and financially.

Cemeteries can never be separated from religion. Yesterday, religion was puritanical—it spoke in the terms of the Ten Commandments—in terms of sacrifice—in terms of Calvary.  Today, religion is gladsome, radiant—it speaks in the terms of the Beatitudes—of joyousness and the Smiling Christ. And so, as the cemeteries of yesterday evidenced the religion of yesterday, so must the successful Memorial Park of tomorrow, evidence the religion of today. Cemeteries are the physical expression of the religious spirit of their time.

My belief is that the Interment organization that demonstrates its right to exist, must prepare to serve the living by not only giving them a safe depository for their beloved dead, but a place that will be spiritually uplifting, physically beautiful, its personnel filled with a sincere desire to serve its fellowman. Such a place will truly express the Memorial Idea. Such is the true conception for the "Creation of a Modern Park Cemetery".

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 43rd Annual Convention
Los Angeles, CA
September 3, 4, 5 and 6, 1929

We are living in an age of extraordinary progress and development. As a country we have been and are in the line of progress. Taking a retrospective view of history, comparing it with the present, we find that the graveyard is occupying a. more prominent place in the minds of the whole community. Burying places must of a necessity exist. As a great truth it needs no introduction other than its own.  In the earliest history of this country the Pilgrims at old Plymouth, Mass., started a burying ground on a strictly lawn plan. In all probability the lawn plan was for the protection of the living. The grave was not mounded, but on a level with the surrounding surface, so that their enemies might not know how fast their numbers were being diminished by death. As time passed on and burying grounds increased we find mounds, and the primitive lawn mowers over the mounds were, often cows and sheep. The grounds were rented for pastures, and in some instances horses and hogs were turned loose to satisfy their hunger with the grass that grew on and between the mounds. The thoughts of it are enough to make the superintendent of a modern cemetery of today shudder, and yet we are informed that in some of the parishes in England at the present day the rector's sheep are pastured in the burying ground; a privilege granted to the rector, but we need not go to other countries than our own to find the dumb beasts feeding on the grass that covers the graves of the departed ones. Often as we look across the valley into a neighboring cemetery we see the horse of the superintendent eating the grass from the mounds of a city cemetery. Modes and customs do not spring up and die like Jonah's gourd. It takes some persons a long time to accept and conform to modern improvement.

As an association we are bonded together for the purpose of improvement, and our assembling together is for the purpose of getting new ideas that will help to do away with the primitive modes of laying out and caring for the burying grounds. Our desire should be to bring before the good Christian people of our communities facts relating to our cemeteries and let them see the improvement that has been made within the past few years.

A well cared for cemetery not only shows respect for those who have passed away, but it is an educator by way of example for the rising generation. From what we have mentioned of the past we can see that great progress has been made and we are glad to know that the people throughout the land speak in high praise of the modern cemetery of today. It is not necessary to delineate the improvements that have been made in our cemeteries; anyone can see the advancement for the better by contrasting some of the country burying grounds with those of cities and villages.

The progress has been great, and we think it worthy of note that almost all of the thinking, planning and executing of the many improvements may be attributed to the superintendent. His position is a peculiar one. The superintendent of a cemetery as well as those of other respectable positions needs a good supply of common sense and he will find plenty of opportunities to bring it into use. He must be gentle and yet firm; he needs to be possessed of more than ordinary executive ability in order to carry forward the desired improvements to complete success and have the modern cemetery a place of order and beauty. We trust that the improvements in the future will be such that soon the pasturing of the burying ground will be a scene of the past. The star of progress has risen, and may it not set until every cemetery throughout the civilized world be classed as modern and the superintendent shall be acknowledged as the pivotal power.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 9th Annual Convention
Richmond, VA
September 18, 19 and 20, 1895

The subject which I have chosen is a large one and only a few of the obstacles can be considered in this paper. My paper will apply more particularly to towns than large cities.

The first thing to be done is to procure a suitable tract of land, and in most cases this will be the first obstacle. Objections of various kinds will be raised. The land will be needed for building purposes, a railroad may wish to pass through it, for the improvement of the town, perhaps new streets may be needed, and other things, many of which can be overcome by choosing a spot at considerable distance from the town or city.

After a funeral procession has started, a half mile more or less makes no great difference.

Another obstacle to be overcome is prejudice; this is the hardest thing to conquer. Many persons will say, "The old graveyard is good enough for me, and it cost less." "What was good enough for my forefathers is good enough for me." This feeling will disappear in a short time if the modern cemetery is in charge of a practical superintendent who will begin his work and finish it as he goes along, that the contrast between the old and the new may be plainly seen. He must not work in a haphazard manner by beginning everywhere, and finishing nowhere.

Still another obstacle to surmount is the matter of setting monuments and headstones. This is of great importance, as nothing looks so bad in a cemetery as monuments that have been imperfectly or poorly set. It is hard to make some lot owners believe that foundations are necessary, and frequently monument men will tell their customers that a foundation is not needed, while other monument dealers will dictate to the superintendent about depth of foundations, and how the grading should be done; matters that they know comparatively nothing about. Your by-laws should regulate these things as well as the matter of curbing. Curbing of lots should not be allowed, but only well kept lawns, good paths, and avenues, which will save both time and money. In the course of time lot owners will see how much better uncurbed, well-graded lots appear, than where there are several kinds of curbing side by side.

Another thing that will give trouble to the superintendent is the stone wagon. When monuments are brought in, no place is too good for the men to drive over; it matters little to them what they destroy as long as they get close to the foundation, set the stone, and get away. The superintendent must determinedly put a stop to this, and see that his rules are enforced. Plenty of good planking, together with all necessary things for unloading in the avenues, should be kept on hand, that the monuments may easily be rolled to their foundations.

A difficulty quite hard to deal with is the cutting of flower beds in the lots by owners. This can hardly be forbidden, yet it should be discouraged as much as possible. Nothing will mar the beauty of a well-kept cemetery more than patches of sod dug up, and a few plants stuck in without any attempt at proper arrangement. Unless the beds are sodded over in the fall, they make unsightly spots in the winter and early spring. The difficulty can be met and overcome, if the superintendent meets the people in a manner that shows he has some consideration for their feelings.

I have before suggested finish as you go, just as far as possible, and have your flower beds so arranged in such places and sufficient quantities that flower beds in lots will appear unnecessary.

In my opinion the next thing to be built after the superintendent's house is a greenhouse. This will pay its way in a short time and will be invaluable in many ways. At the outset it may be difficult to make the trustees and directors see this, but the matter should be urged very strongly by the superintendent, as a greenhouse will be not only a great convenience for the cemetery, but also for lot owners. At the greenhouse they can procure flowers for decoration of graves and other purposes.

In some cemeteries the owners employ anyone they wish to care for their lots. All labor of this kind should be done by men in the employ of the cemetery. This will be difficult to enforce at first especially when starting a new cemetery upon the modern plan, and in a place where there is an old cemetery, a sort of go-as-you-place in which everyone may go in and out whenever they choose and work wherever they wish. I have been in such a cemetery, raised bodies, brought them away without any questions being asked.

No cemetery can be kept as it should be except under the perpetual care system, which should be insisted on from the beginning. One section, not under perpetual care, might be used for single graves; an arrangement which will give poor people a chance to purchase a small lot later on when they have the means. Persons who buy a single grave many times buy a small lot at some later period, when they can afford it and place the lot under perpetual care. The cost of removing bodies to a small lot from a single grave is very low and it is much better to do this way than buy a lot on the installment plan, with which so many cemeteries are continually troubled, often having lots left upon their hands, which have only been paid for in part. The best and safest way is to insist upon payment in full for the lot before any interment is made.

We superintendents must educate the people out of the old idea into the new and strive to make the cemetery what it should be, a modern cemetery. As much thought should be given to the laying out of a cemetery, as would be given to the plans for a park that was to beautify the town or city. Try to create a spark of pride among the people in regard to their cemetery that they may be willing to spend a little money for the sake of having a beautiful place where they may lay their dead. Try to eradicate the old idea that a cemetery must of necessity be a gloomy uninteresting place. The cemetery of the future will be in a great measure what the superintendents of today make it. Let us not forget that we are placed in communities as educators, and have a heavy responsibility resting upon us.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 9th Annual Convention
Richmond, VA
September 18, 19 and 20, 1895

To obtain the best and most satisfactory result from trees and shrubs in connection with cemetery planting is one of more than usual importance.  We have only to look around us in many cemetery grounds to recognize how desirable improvement, from a special standpoint, and by a judicious selection and arrangement of cemetery trees and shrubs becomes. It is generally found as time rolls on, that a large proportion of the trees originally planted are where they should never have been, and as a consequence, have to be cut away before they have really served any useful purpose. The great object of modern cemetery planting is not so much to afford shade, form screens or accomplish other objects of practical importance, as it is that the beautiful picture presented by a skilled display of trees, shrubs and flowers should rob death of the many terrors which the ignorance and superstitions of olden times surrounded it.

The modern idea of a cemetery is not so much that the grave is the end of all as it is that it is the beginning of a new career of happiness which we are taught the new life is to be. The earliest idea of paradise was that of a beautiful garden, and it is impossible to rob the paradise of the future of the same surroundings. The modern cemetery is, therefore, the ideal garden of the future, so far as it is possible for the human intellect to accomplish; and it should be the aim to make pleasurable the visits of the living, by making beautiful the resting places of the dead, leading the mind from gloomy thoughts such as ancient cemeteries fostered; but this beautiful garden must necessarily be subservient to practical details. It is impossible to accomplish anything in this world, that is not a financial success and there is no reason why financial success and the ideal cemetery garden cannot both go hand in hand. And, in fact, the financial aspects require close consideration in connection with the adornment of the grounds. In the planting of the cemetery, therefore, the possible desires of future lot holders should be considered. I knew once of a cemetery which prided itself on the number of rare trees it contained, and which had among its arboreal treasures one of the finest specimens of the Cedar of Lebanon to be found in the United States. The majority of lot holders would have been proud to have possessed such a rare gem. Not so, however, the one who owned it at the time in mind. The superintendent of the company was amazed when the lot holder came one day to insist on cutting down the tree, because it shaded over the grave and moss grew on his marble monument. Determined to save his tree, the superintendent had to make arrangements to give the owner a large price for his lot and sell him another one, and have the interred removed rather than have his beloved tree taken away. Such occurrences as this cannot always be foreseen, but they may be sometimes, and thought should be given in the arrangement and planting of cemeteries to the possibility of such unpleasant occurrences. With this end in view, it would seem desirable, therefore, that portions of the grounds should be reserved expressly for planting in order to beautify and make as nearly as possible an ideal garden spot, while that portion devoted to the lot holders should be as free from planting as would be consistent with the necessary landscape effect. By the judicious selection of these spots, a general landscape effect would be produced which is lacking in very many cemeteries, even in those of recent beginning.

I have frequently felt that sufficient importance has not been attached to the artistic arrangement and planting of the entrance to the cemetery. It was with great pleasure when visiting the Forest Hill Cemetery of Boston; I saw that this had evidently been taken into consideration when the plans of the cemetery were drawn. Who having driven along that broad, sweeping drive, planted on both sides with most beautiful specimens of Blue Spruce, Nordman Fir and other choice evergreens, supplemented with banks of Rhododendrons, Azaleas and handsome thickets of shrubs, and on up through the ivy-covered archway, has not felt that he was indeed entering a beautiful Paradise! I really believe that more attention should be given to the approach to, and the entrance of the cemetery grounds proper, for it is there that visitors get their first impression and first impressions are always the most lasting.

Perhaps this was more impressed upon my mind when I visited Forest Hill, because it was only a few days before this that I saw another cemetery in western New York, where the entrance was directly from the street, through the conventional gateway with its stern granite posts and iron railings. Not but what the grounds of this cemetery were very artistically arranged, but the entrance to it did not give me the same feeling of rest that I experienced when I visited Forest Hill. Yet the entrance to the cemetery of which I speak could very easily have been arranged so as to give one the idea of entering a beautiful park, simply by placing the entrance proper a little distant from the street, and massing a number of choice evergreens, trees and shrubs on both sides of its sweeping driveway.

It is not my intention to go into the details of how to plant a cemetery, because that is the province of a landscape gardener; I merely wish to throw out a few hints or points which to me seem to be frequently overlooked, and this question of an artistically planted entrance is, I think, one that particularly needs attention. It seems to me that it is your duty, gentlemen, to let no opportunity escape to instruct your lot holders how to keep in touch with the improved and more advanced aims of the modern cemetery. Every one is prone to do a certain thing because custom has made it popular and this is as true in cemetery matters as in everything else.  The huge marble or granite shaft, rarely an object of beauty and sometimes but a mere display of wealth, is usually erected with the best intentions, and its use is still a custom mainly because it is believed to be the most fitting thing to do and lot holders have not learned a more advanced idea. And this is just where the question arises - What is the most advanced idea by which we can satisfy that desire to do something to show how the dead are missed or loved? Would not the planting of rare trees and plants be more fitting and bear testimony to our love to a far greater extent than does the erection of monuments? Do not visitors at a cemetery show more real love for the trees and flowers than they do for a block of marble or granite, upon which more frequently they look with more curiosity than respect? There is no doubt that our dead soldiers are more honored and the living more inspired by the strewing of flowers annually on their graves, than they would be by mere monuments alone. We must get lot holders to remember with us that beautiful trees and shrubs produce beautiful thoughts, and keep us, as it were, in communion with those we have lost, and that trees, shrubs and flowers are, therefore, more fitting than monuments. The most choice and beautiful evergreens that could be selected would cost but a small portion of the value of a monument, and would leave a handsome fund to be placed in the hands of the superintendent for the annual care necessary to keep the lot in a beautiful condition.

I understand that no marble monument or headstone marks the spot of the famous Nicholas Longworth, one of the pioneers in the industrial development of Cincinnati, and possibly the father of modern strawberry culture, but that he sleeps beneath the spreading branches of a noble elm tree.

I think that you will all agree with me that the time is here for some changes in this direction. Many of you have already passed rules forbidding the erection of marble copings, iron railings, and I think in some cases tall headstones. A few years ago this would not have been possible, but today the people have more advanced ideas, and through your teachings are becoming willing to discard these things. Even in the matter of headstones and monuments they are showing a desire to design them after ideas more natural than the marble shaft and square or rounded top headstone. This is shown by the imitations of tree trunks, and boulders now frequently seen in cemeteries. The monument in Harleigh Cemetery near the main entrance representing a column of stones, doubtless attracted the attention of many of you and each of you perhaps have in the cemeteries which you superintend, monuments, the erection of which has been suggested by some seemingly appropriate object in nature. It is but a step from the imitation of nature to the real, and I firmly believe that the transition would not be so difficult of accomplishment as one might suppose. Let but a few of your lot holders start the work and others will quickly follow. It is probable that the idea may be too radical for its full accomplishment at an early date, but I have no doubt but what it will come in time just as other reforms have been adopted after persistent efforts have been made to bring them about.

It is always a Source of regret that there is not more desire for more meritorious trees and shrubs in cemetery planting. Why should quantities of Arbor-Vitae, Norway Spruce, Austrian or Scotch Pine be used, when the more rare and vastly more beautiful Nordman Fir, Oriental Spruce, Englemans Spruce, Douglas Spruce and the superb Colorado Blue Spruce and Swiss Pine could be used to as great advantage? It certainly should not be because the first named are cheaper, for first cost in planting should not be a consideration, as the work is to last one may say forever. To be sure, there are portions of the United States where some of these named may not be hardy, but there are many that will thrive almost anywhere. The Blue Spruce, Douglas Fir, Englemans Spruce and the Picea concolor are all natives of the mountains of Colorado, and should thrive in almost any portions of the United States, unless the soil of the particular spot be unfavorable. It is not commonly known that plants which are apparently not hardy in a more northern climate than where they are indigenous prove quite so if they are protected when they are small until they become established. The most northern limit of the Magnolia grandiflora is I think North Carolina yet we in Philadelphia and vicinity have no difficulty in getting it to grow if we protect the tree for a few years until it can force roots below the frost line. There are several of these trees in Philadelphia that are not less than twenty-five feet high.

It is impossible for anyone to say positively what might or might not thrive in a certain locality. This can only be learned by the individual efforts of yourselves. Select what you believe would thrive in your soil and climate and test it for a year or two; the cost would be trifling, and every time you find something new or uncommon that will grow in your cemetery, you will have added a new subject of interest to your grounds.

Of late years the planting of evergreen beds has become quite popular; and in many of the more recently designed cemeteries and, in fact, in a number of the older ones, numerous beds are now planted. There is scarcely any form of Spruce, Fir, Arbor-Vitae or Retinospora that cannot be used in this connection, as by frequent trimming, even the larger growing sorts can be kept within reasonable bounds, and at the same time a much finer color will develop from the constant pruning. The great labor and cost of planting large beds of greenhouse plants annually have had much to do with the advancement of the evergreen bed,--as in the latter case the first cost is the greatest one.

During the last few years there have been many introductions of plants from Japan which have been found to be extremely hardy, and also many from Europe and remote parts of our own country, and it may be desirable to mention a few of these that would doubtless be valuable for cemetery work. The Cercidiphyllum, a Japanese tree, has proven hardy in many sections of the country where it has been tried. It is a pyramidal tree, but rather more spreading than either the Lombardy Poplar or the Pyramidal Oak. It seems particularly adapted to heavy soils, and especially to low and damp situations, where it makes quite a strong and rapid growth. The Kolrcuteria is a Chinese tree, making a low, spreading growth.  In July it is densely covered with very large panicles of yellow flowers and is particularly attractive at that time. It is not a new tree, but rather uncommon. One of the prettiest trees adapted to cemetery planting which has recently been introduced is the Styrax Japonica, few things can be more beautiful than the pearly white flower, abundantly produced in the early part of July. The Pterostyrax hispidum is also a valuable addition, a rather spreading tree, of moderately rapid growth, and covered in May with drooping racemes of white flowers entirely covering the tree. This I think will become extremely popular, when it is thoroughly well known.

Of improved varieties of our native trees, nothing seems to have become more popular than the forms of Cornus florida, the red flowered and the weeping. These with the parent plant seem to be adapted to all soils, situations and climates, and consequently are found largely in all cemeteries. The red flowered form is particularly beautiful in spring when covered with bloom, though later, as with the other two, when it assumes its varying tints of autumn coloring, few plants exceed it in gorgeousness.

The recent introductions among shrubs are too numerous to mention, doubtless they have been brought to your notice many times. A class of plants which have sprung into great prominence in a short period is hardy perennials and they need more than a passing word, indeed, a whole chapter could be written of the many useful positions they might occupy in our ornamental planting. A class of plants which after planting become more and more beautiful every year as the roots become stronger, and which, by judicious selection of varieties give a continuation of bloom from early spring to late fall and exist in form from those of low and dwarf habit to plants making a growth from five to six feet are what perennials comprise. It would be useless for me to attempt to name desirable varieties, as this would depend upon the soil and location where the particular bed is to be planted, but I can assure you that you would never regret the use of these plants in your work, and would find the study of varieties particularly adapted to your necessities of great interest to you.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 8th Annual Convention
Philadelphia, PA
September 11, 12 and 13, 1894

The Committee on program has asked me to discuss the management of a modern cemetery, but if I confine myself to telling how we manage Lakewood, in Minneapolis, I feel that I will be better able to offer something which will be worthy of the attention of the members of the National Association. If, while talking about Lakewood, I am able to make suggestions that will be useful to gentlemen who are interested in the management of modern cemeteries the purpose of this paper will be fulfilled.

Lakewood is conducted on what is known as the mutual plan, and every lot owner is entitled to a vote at the annual election of trustees. All lots are sold with a provision for perpetual care, one-fifth of the receipts from these sales being placed in the hands of a trust company for that purpose. It seems to me, however, that the proper way to create this fund is to estimate the amount per foot which will be required at interest to maintain the grounds, and set it aside for each foot of ground sold, instead of figuring a percentage of sales, as is the rule at Lakewood.

The management is vested in nine trustees, three of whom are elected annually. An executive committee of three is appointed by the president to manage the finances, arid have general supervision of ail cemetery work. This committee has all the power of a full board and our expenditures must be approved by at least one member of it.

The superintendent has a monthly report blank which contains a statement of receipts and expenditures for the month, and for the year-to-date, a copy of the trial balance for the past month, and a recapitulation or balance for the year-to-date. All accounts of money transactions are kept in the city office, together with a set of plats, records of deeds, and lot and interment records. At the cemetery is kept a daily interment record, giving name, age, social state, nativity, place and date of death, place and date of burial and name of undertakers officiating, also, duplicate sets of plats and interment and lot owner's records. Our books show in itemized form all sources of income and expense, and we are able at any time, by referring to them, to know what departments yield a profit. We also itemize our maintenance account daily, keeping an accurate record of the time on each kind of work.

Our sources of income are eight in number, and they may be named in this order: Sale of lots, burial fees, single grave fees, special care of flowers, building foundations, setting monuments, vault charges and box making.

Of course, the lot sales are the principal source of income. Prices range from fifty cents to one dollar and fifty cents per square foot, according to location, the average price as per sales for the past two years being about seventy cents. In prosperous times, it should be said however, this average would be much higher.

In a cemetery conducted on the mutual plan, as is Lakewood, the price need be set only high enough to pay running expenses, erect and maintain proper buildings and secure the amount per foot that is necessary to guarantee perpetual care. The prices in some cemeteries are greater than with us, but the prices of preparing the ground originally is also greater. Before offering any part of a section for sale we grade and plat the entire section, put in heavy cast iron corner stones for each lot, and make the price cover the whole. I have heard of cemeteries where there was a special charge for grading and another charge for posts; and, indeed, until a few years ago that was the practice at Lakewood. I think that the plan we are now pursuing is decidedly the better.

The superintendent at Lakewood has a small index book, which he carries in his pocket, and which contains, in order, a statement of every lot sold and unsold in the cemetery, an alphabetical index of lot owners, and considerable other information of value. This book is used in the sale of lots, and we find it much more convenient than carrying plats around with us. When a person decides to buy a lot we issue him a sale ticket giving date, number of lot, price, etc. This ticket is taken to the city office, where the contracts are signed and the cash handled. When I assumed control of Lakewood it was the rule to make no burials until lots had been fully paid for, but I was not long in seeing that such a rule was keeping away many deserving people who otherwise would have been our patrons. Accordingly I induced the trustees to try the contract system, and I am sure that it has been a success. Our usual terms are one-third down, and the balance divided into monthly or quarterly payments which draw six percent interest. Such a plan makes it easy for a man in moderate circumstances to buy a desirable lot. We have a printed form which this class of purchasers sign. Under it we are empowered, in case payments are not made promptly, to remove all monumental work and any bodies which may be buried in the lots, to lots equaling in value the money that has been paid, after deducting the removal expenses.

Our charges for burial and this includes opening, closing and sodding graves, and re-sodding when the dirt settles, are four dollars for persons under twelve years of age, and five dollars for persons twelve years or over. This is probably as cheap as the work can be done without loss, although I have in mind cemeteries where the charges are less. Whether their services are the same as ours or not I cannot say.

In winter all bodies are deposited in the receiving tomb, and for this no charge is made, unless they are removed for burial to other cemeteries, or remain in the vault after June 1st. from which date a charge is made of two dollars per month per body. At the time of deposit in the tomb we make a charge to lot owners of the price of burial, which pays for the burial in the spring. To persons who are not lot owners we make a charge of the price of a single grave, which amount is credited in the spring, if a lot is purchased, or pays for a single grave. If a body is removed from our grounds for burial the full amount of the deposit is retained.

During the summer months few bodies are placed in the receiving tomb, and those few we require to be sealed in zinc-lined boxes, as is the rule with contagious diseases.

For single graves we charge up to twelve years of age, twelve dollars; twelve years of age and over, fifteen dollars. This includes opening closing and sodding the grave; and in case a lot is purchased, the amount less the burial fee is credited. We allow no individual mounds in the single grave section, but instead make the burials in a long tier, the width being the length of two graves foot to foot, with a four foot walk at the head depressed four inches. Our single grave section receives the same care in every way that is given the other parts of the grounds.

For special care of flowers, watering, etc., we charge $1.50 for each grave or vase for the season. This item is a source of some profit to the association, and of course the more flowers that are under care the better the grounds look.  Planting is not allowed on individual lots, except on graves and in vases.

All foundations and other underground work are done by the association.  Charges for foundations are: twenty cubic feet, or less, thirty-five cents per foot; over twenty cubic feet thirty cents. We require foundations to be laid under all work larger than 6 x 12 inches. That the association should do all work of this sort I consider quite important, for contractors will not do it properly, unless an inspector is constantly with them. In this connection I will speak of the setting of monuments, for the association does the entire monument setting in Lakewood, except in small cases. This requires one good man, accustomed to handling ropes and to directing men, but the other help can be common labor. By setting our monuments we are saved a great deal of annoyance, and realize a profit besides. Contractors allowed in cemeteries to do such work are chronic borrowers. They want ropes, blocks, planks, bars and numerous other things, in a great many cases forgetting to return them. The result is that when you need them a grand hunt is in order.  Contractors also seem to take a delight in hitching guy ropes to trees and in many ways they are great nuisances in a well regulated cemetery.

Nearly all of the pine boxes used in Lakewood is furnished by the association. As many of our funerals are arranged by telephone, this is a great convenience to us and to the undertaker. It saves the latter a trip from the city with a box while we can take the box direct to the grave and put men to work, knowing that we have the proper dimensions. Our box account last year paid for nearly all the lumber that was used at the cemetery, and had a credit of about two hundred dollars besides. We buy the sides and ends sawed to size and saw the tops and bottoms on the grounds. "Rainy day work" is what we call box making, for whenever it rains hard enough to interfere with the regular routine, the teamsters and other employees who are paid by the month, turn in to make boxes.

There are minor sources of income, not mentioned in this paper, but it is scarcely worth while taking up your time to name them.

The common laborers in the grounds are directly under a foreman who looks to the superintendent for instructions. He hires and discharges his own men, and I think this is the best plan, for when men know that a foreman has absolute authority over them their respect for him will increase and the character of their work will improve. The mechanics, watchmen and other assistants are hired by the superintendent, who looks after them in person. All work is itemized daily, so that at any time we can know exactly what any piece of work is costing us.

We have no special set of men for grave digging, or mowing, but accustom the employees to all kinds of labor, in this way being prepared for any emergency.

The hours for keeping the grounds open are 7:00 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. during the summer months; late in the fall and during the winter the gates are closed at 5:30 or 6 o'clock in the evening.

As is the case in many cemeteries, we have as yet been unable to bring about all of the reforms suggested by the association members. But we are slowly working toward improved conditions and hope to do better in the future. I think that you will find that where a large city cemetery is behind the times, it is more frequently the fault of the lot owners, than of the cemetery management, for every important reform is contested inch by inch.

It is quite possible that in this somewhat hurried account of how business is done at Lakewood I have told little that is new. The principal good coming from these annual meetings is the exchange of ideas that they encourage; each member being invited to bring the best that he has, and exhibit it for the benefit of his neighbor, to the end that the neighbor, if he sees fit may profit by it or offer suggestions that may be a source of profit to others. It is in this spirit that I came before you today, hoping, that if I am not able to be of any special service to you in what I have said you may be of service to me in the discussions that are to follow.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 8th Annual Convention
Philadelphia, PA
September 11, 12 and 13, 1894

Our honorable and untiring Executive Committee has assigned me the most arduous task of presenting the subject of what is "Generally the Best and Most Approved System of Blending New Territory with an Old Cemetery." When I first received notice and began to give the subject some consideration, I also began to feel something like a skipper in mid-ocean without his compass, as the subject implies discussion rather than presentation never having heard of a "Generally best or most approved system." You can readily see the difficulty of preparing even an approved paper, so I immediately notified the committee of my inability to comply, but as our committee is composed of men that know no failure and are strangers to excuses, I submissively bow to their wishes and try to accomplish something out of nothing, therefore this paper may be somewhat disappointing. but I feel that after you have taken the situation in you will overlook any short-comings; but if there is one thing more than another that has forcibly impressed itself upon my mind, it is the usefulness and the benefits of the American Association of Cemetery Superintendents, and why the subject should be assigned to one of the Junior members is also beyond the writer's comprehension. However, the subject is well worthy of much consideration, but time forbids.

In blending new territory with an old cemetery, there are many difficulties to contend with, and I shall be candid in saying that I need to be informed upon what is "Generally the best and most approved system," therefore can only consider from an individual standpoint and not from experience or suggestion from aids that are entirely out of reach.

In blending new territory with an old cemetery, much depends upon locality and how much nature has done for the new and how much of nature has been disfigured and destroyed in the old.

When new territory is to be added to an old cemetery, I know of no better system than a gradual emerging from the old into the new. This may necessitate the modifying of some of the old lines, and where possible, the entire changing of others that have marred the natural beauty. This may also require, to some extent, a disfigurement of the new, that a gradual blending may be accomplished from the old into the beautiful and picturesque appearance of the Ideal Modern Cemetery.

I believe that the modern cemetery of today is only the beginning of possibilities of the modern cemetery of the future therefore, what might be the most approved system today twenty years hence would not be considered at all. Again, supposing that the new territory has no natural beauty and mechanical skill has done all for the old, I would say the first approved step is to get out of the old, stiff, miry ruts, and study to imitate nature rather than mechanical perfection, and only where necessary should mechanical means be applied that nature's beauty may be made perfect.

Man can chisel, carve and shape, but petrified skill is not all that makes the landscape beautiful. Knowing then what is most desired, a plat of the whole should be made. We are then ready to carry our system into practice, hence after you have put this through the dissecting process, it will stand or fall as an approved or disapproved system of blending new territory with an old cemetery.

Our constitution says "The object of this association shall be the advancement of the interests and the elevation of the character of cemeteries in America."

The interests of a cemetery are advanced by anything that adds to its material welfare, such as the introduction of simpler methods, the keeping of better accounts and records, greater economy in the expense for labor and material, dispensing with unnecessary drives and walks, and by preserving the natural beauty of the grounds and doing whatever will add to their attractiveness. We come together once a year to get new ideas from each other in regard to various methods of doing work, to impart our best thoughts and to listen to such criticisms as may be made. We come to test our own work by what we hear and see. A number of cemetery associations have sent their superintendents to visit the leading cemeteries of this country. These associations are satisfied that the information thus gained is worth more than the time and money expended to obtain it. These meetings serve a similar purpose. We do not, perhaps, visit as many cemeteries as we would during a trip made for that purpose, but we can in a few minutes get the opinion of more than fifty members in regard to any subject of general interest. We secure a more extended criticism than we could in any other way.

The interests of cemeteries are also advanced by everything that tends to give them stability, freedom from encroachments and by provisions for their perpetual care and maintenance. The experience of one cemetery may be of great assistance to another in regard to any of these matters.

But our highest mission will not be fulfilled unless we do something to elevate the character of cemeteries. A cemetery serves its purpose when it does two things: First, when it takes care of the dead organic material of human bodies; second, when it serves by its neatness, its beauty, its quietness, its seclusion and its assurance of a permanent resting place to assuage the sorrow of those who have lost their friends. It fills its highest purpose when it accomplishes these two results in a rational manner. What constitutes such a manner is, therefore, a fit subject for our discussion. It is generally acknowledged that the final destiny of a body is to be resolved into the elements of which it was composed. Shall we seek to postpone this process as did the ancient Egyptians? Shall we stow away the bodies of our friends in mausoleums to remain ghastly objects for untold years and perhaps finally be disposed of as mummies are now? Or shall they be placed in the sweet fresh earth to be absorbed and transformed into trees and grass and flowers? Or, again, shall they be dissipated in an hour to the clouds in a colorless vapor? These are questions that concern everybody. Perhaps they should be answered first by physicians and then should be answered in our meetings. Our answer may not have much influence but it will undoubtedly have some, directly through the people we meet, and indirectly through the paper which we were influential in starting. We should discuss these matters so that our personal influence and the influence of our published report will be in the right direction.

If inhumation is recommended, what can be done to bring the body in closer contact with the earth? This is a question that ought to be solved by undertakers, but they are interested in selling as many boxes as possible. We can advocate the use of paper coffins and the omission of the outside box with the calmness of philosophers. But cremation maybe endorsed. What effect would the adoption of this method have on the sale of lots in cemeteries? What should be done with the ashes that are left?

With any disposition that may be made of the dead, what should be done with regard to funerals? If, as some aver, they are relics of barbarism, how can they be abolished? The funeral procession comes to the cemetery and friends, neighbors and perhaps strangers and idle curiosity seekers gather around to see how bad the mourners feel, to gaze on some celebrated character that has attended the funeral, or to ask questions about the private affairs of the deceased. If this had not been the custom for ages, could we imagine a more trying ordeal for grief stricken people to pass through? With all our advancement in material things and even in religion, why have we not adopted some simpler manner of burying our dead, some custom that would accord with our instinctive desire for seclusion and quietness? Perhaps it is because people shrink from thinking of such matters, and they would no doubt like suggestions from those who have to give attention to these things.

In seeking to elevate the character of cemeteries, a very pleasant field of study presents itself which helps to counterbalance the disagreeable part of our work. It is always a pleasure to try to make things beautiful and this pleasure increases with increased efforts so that we learn to appreciate more and more the wonderful beauty of leaf and stem and flower with their infinite variety of texture, shape and color with their waving vistas and changing outlines giving a most interesting boundary to clouds and sky. I cannot help thinking that our cemeteries should be made for the living rather than the dead, that they should be viewed with joy and gladness for their artistic perfection rather than sadness for the dead they hold; that with their beauty of foliage and songs of birds they should exert as refining an influence as good painting or fine music. Such a character, certainly, would not detract from their memorial value. The work of our association may be called complete when not only the cemeteries about all our cities shall become equal to our ideals, but when every little country burying ground; instead of being an eyesore, as at present, shall be as beautiful as a charming bit of nature.

In conclusion let me say that the object of our association should be work, not play. We must not regard our meetings as a time for our own pleasure and gratification. Incidentally, we come in contact with some kindred spirits at our meetings, and we have an agreeable change from the ordinary routine of our duties, but I like to think of this as a pleasant change in work rather than a vacation. A vacation suggests a change of thoughts and a throwing off of responsibility. By looking out of the car windows, by going to the cemeteries and parks of the towns we visit, and by listening to what is said at our meetings, we can get ideas from the time we leave home till we return, and nothing will be of more value to the institutions we work for than ideas coupled with good judgment. Our report should embody these ideas in as brief and interesting a manner as possible. Of course there are many things said at our meetings that are not of general or lasting interest. These should be eliminated from our report, not simply to save the expense but to save as well the time of whoever may read it. So long as we live up to our constitution and make these annual meetings add to our knowledge and efficiency and so indirectly improve our cemeteries and the tastes of those who use them, our society will prosper and its influence will continue to grow. But when the idea of our individual enjoyment takes precedence, the best days of the society will have passed.

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 7th Annual Convention
Minneapolis, MN
August 22, 23 and 24, 1893

Through the courtesy of the Omaha Convention Committee I have been asked to read a paper discussing this Association from the view point of an outsider. The man who is accountable for the suggestion is present and his identity will be disclosed so that he may pay the penalty in case anything in the remarks which are to follow should arouse your spirit of pugnacity.

That cemeteries do not always receive that which is supposed to be coming to them was demonstrated in the following incident. A hurry-up order was received at a Wisconsin cheese factory for a shipment of "limburger" conditioned on immediate delivery. Shipping limburger by express in winter had been prohibited, and the order was about to be turned down when a salesman took the matter in hand and proceeded to deliver the goods. He obtained an undertaker's rough box, packed in it the required amount of cheese, and engaged an undertaker to deliver it at the railroad station a few minutes before the time for the train to depart. The salesman, attired in his most somber clothes, arrived just in time to purchase two tickets. Shortly before the train reached its destination he went to the express car and found the express-man in a somewhat excited frame of mind. The heat from the stove had caused the cheese to emit the most unbearable odor imaginable and the air was thick enough to cut with a knife. "What can I do for you?" shouted the express-man, going about with his nose in the air. "I just came to be sure that the body will be put off at the next station" was the reply. "Well, I'm, mighty glad of it, and let me say right here if that man in the box is a friend of yours you surely have one consolation-you may be damned sure he's not in a trance."  It is needless to add that case never reached a cemetery.

The futility of attempting to do more than lightly touch the high points in a survey of the activities of an association whose existence ex tends over one-third of a century in the time that can be allotted me is sufficiently obvious to require no apology. I am "an outsider" as far as ever having had any actual experience in the management of a cemetery, but for many years my interests kept me closely in touch with cemeteries, and I am proud of having been a booster for the AACS before it was organized and of having had the honor of being present at its beginning, when "Father" Nichols officiated on that memorable occasion in 1887. I recall receiving a letter from Mr. Nichols in which he rejoiced at the prospect of having an attendance at twenty-five at that first meeting.

This organization came into existence at the time when what were called "rural" cemeteries were taking the place of the time-honored church-yard burying grounds and city graveyards, which had about reached their lowest ebb. Lot owners did things according to their own sweet wills, enclosures of any and every description were permitted, and established grades were an unknown quantity, the only known quantity being what some plain speaking superintendents of today would, in every day parlance, designate as "junk." Men were seeking light on the subject of cemetery betterment when Mr. Nichols, who, inspired by the suggestion of your own honored life-member, Mr. William Salway, sent forth his appeal in behalf of an organization which should undertake that very work. Mr. Salway had recently been appointed as successor to Mr. Adolph Strauch, superintendent or the Cemetery of Spring Grove, where the first really modern lawn plan cemetery had been established the brain child of that gifted landscape gardener, and the most appropriate birthplace possible for the AACS. The men who gathered on that auspicious occasion were imbued with enthusiastic zeal and a most commendable desire to reform the cemetery practices of their day, but they were by no means unanimous as to how it was to be accomplished. It is interesting to note that the first vice president, for example, was a staunch advocate of high grave mounds, and another member favored having a "gravel path on at least one side of every lot and corner posts several inches above the surface."

These men however, "builded better than they knew". The results of their early deliberations have made American cemeteries the admiration of travelers from all parts of the world; for nowhere on the globe are there to be seen cemeteries that can compare in park-like beauty and scrupulous care with those under the management of the men whom I have the honor to address.

At the second meeting of the Association, held in Brooklyn in 1888, Mr. Eurich, in his prophetic paper, on "An Ideal Cemetery", said "In all artificial and architectural structures there must be no evident desire to show what art and mechanics can produce, but they must all be in harmony with and in subordination to nature." In the remarkable development apparent in American cemeteries we do not yet note an entire absence of "evident desire"-ostentation still obtrudes itself as it always has in the sacred precincts of the dead, but fortunately, those who still believe in gratifying their pride in this manner are obliged to conform to rules and regulations which either prevent the erection of inartistic memorials or minimize their most objectionable features, and none can gainsay that very much has been accomplished in bringing "architectural structures" in closer "harmony with and subordination to nature." In Mr. Eurich's paper above quoted, he expressed the most radical views concerning monuments, and at the Cleveland convention in 1900, Mr. Hatch, a prominent citizen and member of the Board of Trustees of Lake View Cemetery, advanced the idea of abolishing monuments entirely. It was such discussions as these that gave impetus to the most advanced ideas in cemetery practice.

The education of the public as to what constitutes harmony in a cemetery has not been an easy task. Rules that seemed harsh and arbitrary to the lot holder were not easily enforced because these rules were misunderstood, and much bitterness resulted, when only the most harmonious relations should have existed. The pioneer work in this most beneficent reform was done by the founders of this Association, and those who now follow in their steps know as little of the trials with which they had to contend as does this present generation of the hardships of the pioneers of our own fair land.

"Graceland", Chicago, "Spring Grove", Cincinnati, and "Lake View"', Cleveland, and possibly others, set apart entire sections or portions of sections in which monuments were prohibited, or, if allowed, were permitted to extend only a few inches above the ground. Other cemeteries soon followed this example, and it has been the experience of many of the members of this Association to hear lot owners express their approval of the, restrictive rules pertaining to monuments. Old and revered though the custom may be, its observance had been carried to an excess, and rules that would correct this abuse were a natural result. Progressive monument builders who have caught the spirit of the ideas advanced by advocates of the modern lawn plan realize that the restrictive rules which may seem somewhat arbitrary were in reality adopted not so much with the intention of eliminating monuments, as of elevating their standard. Monument builders who are not cooperating with their local cemetery managers lack vision, and retard their own progress. But it is gratifying to note that the Memorial Craftsmen of America are now urging closer cooperation between that Association and this.

This Association has disseminated information of immeasurable value to cemeteries pertaining to the subject of acquiring funds for the future care of cemeteries. Perpetual care has been and doubtless will continue to be a perennial subject for consideration. Long-term financing as applied to cemetery lots and the structures erected thereon is a complex problem. Perpetual care involves many considerations, not the least uncertain of which is the earning power of the unstable dollar. Think of what must be taking place in Germany today, if they have perpetual care funds based on the pre-war value of the mark. The ablest minds in this Association have deliberated on it, and only future generations can tell whether our present systems have made good. My sole purpose in alluding to the subject at this time is to direct attention to an angle from which it is seldom discussed, namely, the proper safeguarding of funds of this nature. Lot owners, who by bequest or otherwise, place sums of money in the keeping or cemetery companies for a certain specified purpose, do so with implicit confidence that the conditions of the trust will be faithfully complied with. The question arises, "are cemeteries availing themselves of the safest means of keeping their trust funds from falling into the hands of dishonest or incompetent persons or of those who, through indifference will fail to have a proper regard for their trust?" Trust companies of recognized responsibility are, by virtue of their experience, conceded to be the safest depositories for cemetery funds. Granting that the funds are placed in such hands, can they be said to be properly safeguarded unless both the trust company and the cemetery trustees are obligated to conform to conditions that will render violations or the trust impossible?  A distinguished Chicago attorney, who has made a very thorough investigation of the subject, is authority for the statement that in his opinion, the perpetual care funds of some of the best known cemeteries are not as properly safeguarded as they should be. While there may be no question whatever as to the integrity of the men who are handling these funds today, these officers and their immediate successors will be responsible for them but a comparatively short space of time, a few generations will see them under the control of those far removed from present day conditions: it is, therefore, obvious that cemetery associations cannot be too careful in safeguarding such trusts, and that there should be more rigid laws in every state in the Union concerning them. Without the least desire to cast any shadow of doubt upon the integrity of those who will come after us, it is surely not only the part of wisdom, but an imperative duty as well, to so protect these sacred trusts that they will riot tempt man's cupidity, or, having tempted it, will make impossible any, attempt to divert them to any other purpose than that for which they were originally intended.

Progress in the development of American cemeteries has more than kept pace with other branches of Art and Industry. To continue this record of achievement and pass on to posterity cemeteries that will be a blessing and not a burden, it behooves cemetery managers to give more serious consideration to the subject of endowing mausoleums and other cemetery structures, to provide for their future upkeep. While the importance of this matter has been recognized at many cemeteries, and the necessary action taken, this practice is by no means as general as it should be. The boards of trustees of many cemeteries that stand high in the estimation of the public, are either ignoring or purposely side-stepping the issue, for fear of offending lot owners. In so doing, they have allowed many costly structures to be erected without making the slightest provision for repairs that will be inevitable in years to come. The ultimate result of this unwise course will reflect upon the cemetery, builders of today. In this connection it is interesting to note that the City Commission of Grand Rapids, Mich., has adopted very rigid rules concerning the endowment of mausoleums in "Woodlawn", the new municipal cemetery: these rules also prohibit vertical joints in all monumental work: The question that naturally arises in this connection is, "what is the most practical method by which to determine the amount of endowment necessary?" Some cemeteries solve this complex problem by requiring a minimum deposit of ten percent or fifteen percent of the cost of the proposed structure. The consensus of opinion is that it is not practical to arrive at even an average percentage to use as a basis for estimating such deposit. This subject has not been stressed by the AACS to an extent commensurate with its importance.  Mr. Eurich discussed it in a very informing paper several years ago, but the matter is one so far-reaching it should be reiterated again and again.
 
Landscape engineers and gardeners who have gradually transformed our cemeteries from places of gloom to spots of sylvan restfulness and beauty have had their visions of the cemetery beautiful just as truly as any sculptor, artist, or artisan has had his ideal. Discouragements have come to them just as they have to all who have labored earnestly to express their highest ideals in their work. In this respect the experience of the cemetery idealist is unique: he has been obliged to contend with not only the prejudices of the public, but in many instances with unsympathetic boards of trustees whose vision was dimmed by the figures on the balance sheet.

There is (and quite naturally too) a division of sentiment among the members of this Association as to what will constitute the ideal cemetery. That it will be far more park-like than many of our cemeteries of the present day is very evident from the trend of present cemetery planning. No landscape gardener of any reputation would think of recommending a plan for a new cemetery or for remodeling an old one that did not conform to present-day practice in planning and planting, and in regulating the extent to which stone work shall be permitted. Rapid progress has been made in approaching what is believed to be the ideal most to be desired, and in many cemeteries as beautiful effects have been created with trees and shrubbery as are possible under similar conditions. There will be still greater improvement when lot holders give their sincere cooperation, and are willing to consider the cemetery as a whole more than they do their individual lots, when selecting their memorials.

There are few professions or callings in whose daily labors the apathy of the public is so constantly in evidence, as in that of the cemetery man, be he sexton, superintendent, or manager, and the apathy is not always confined to the public; it frequently is seen in the indifference of members of boards of trustees or directors whose failure to provide for the needs of the cemetery is reflected in the inability of a handicapped, disheartened superintendent to obtain the results he knows are expected of him. This spirit of indifference is illustrated by the experience of the man who was soliciting funds for a fence to enclose the village cemetery. "What's the use", said the villager; “of putting a fence around a graveyard?  Then what’s in can't get out, and then what’s out don’t want get in."

The public has always been apathetic on the subject of cemeteries and will continue to remain so until it has been educated out of this undesirable state of mind.  Educators are loud in their praises of moving pictures as a means of making lasting impressions on the minds of the young – the minds of older persons are equally impressionable when the subject under discussion is one that has sentimental reasons as its basis of appeal. The educational value of illustrated lectures on this subject has not received the consideration which could profitably be given it in any community.

The necessary qualifications of a successful cemetery superintendent are many and varied. The outstanding factor of his success is found in his ability to render just the kind of service that the emergency calls for. This implies tactfulness such as shown when Mrs. Newlyrich consulted the superintendent in regard to the most appropriate flowers for the grave of her late husband, who she said was very fond of smoking.  She thought that sweet-smelling tobacco plant and some salivas would make a real nice bed: "yes" replied the tactful superintendent, "and we'll border it with some beautiful spittoonias." Needless to remark he made a hit with that lot owner.
 
The service rendered by your late Mr. W. C. Rapp, of Fort Plain Cemetery, Fort Plain, NY, endeared him to his lot holders and enabled him to establish a record unique and worthy or emulation.  Years ago Mr. Rapp became imbued with the idea that cemetery memorials could be made to fill a two-fold purpose by serving the public in a useful way and also perpetuating the memory of the departed. Through Mr. Rapp's efforts several noteworthy memorials of this character have been erected in Fort Plain Cemetery. (They, with other cemetery memorials of this kind, will be illustrated at the close of this paper.) Herein lies a very pertinent suggestion for cemeteries to profit by: bring to the attention of your lot owners the thought of erecting memorial chapels, entrances, conservatories, fountains, etc., that more real significance may attach to their memorials, always remembering that no such memorials should be erected without adequate endowment. Memorials of this character have been referred to as utilitarian, and therefore unfit. That the public is not in sympathy with that idea is seen in the constantly increasing number of memorials of this nature.

In connection with the subject of useful memorials is not this centenary of the birth of Adolph Strauch a most opportune time for this Association to establish a memorial scholarship in his name that would assist and encourage young men and young women who may desire to follow the profession of landscape gardening as applied to cemeteries? Mr. Strauch originated and put into practice the landscape lawn plan in cemeteries. He was superintendent of the Cemetery of Spring Grove from 1854 until the time of his death in 1883, during which period he corrected and cultivated public taste concerning cemeteries in the face of the bitterest and almost insurmountable opposition, and laid the foundation for the high standard of cemetery development we enjoy today.

Statistics ordinarily make dry reading: a few, however, pertaining to the membership of the AACS may not be without interest. In 1897, at the close of the first ten years of the Association's existence, the membership was 192; in 1907 two hundred nineteen; in 1917, two hundred eighty and four years later, the Detroit report showed an enrollment of 360. Analyzing this membership, we find that approximately sixty percent of it comes from six states, numerically in the following order-Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio, Illinois, Massachusetts and Michigan. Of the forty-odd members west of the Mississippi River, two thirds are from Iowa, Minnesota and Missouri. In the states south of the Ohio and including the great state of Texas, the membership is about 30. It is also interesting to note that of the 68 cities in the U. S. with a population exceeding 100,000, twenty-five percent are not represented in your membership. These figures are given simply to show that there still remains a vast territory into which the inspiring message of this Association has not been carried.

Every cemetery manager is interested in knowing how other cemetery managers get the best results, and this Association has been the means of gratifying that desire. There are, however, thousands of cemeteries whose managers seldom, if ever, have the opportunity of participating in the deliberations of this national organization, who could be benefitted through state organizations. Organizations of this kind will not be formed without leaders, and who are better qualified for such service than the men who have made this Association what it is today? Ohio and New England have demonstrated what can be done in this direction and what cemetery men in those states have accomplished, others can.  The Ohio Association has a membership of seventy-eight, twenty-two of whom are members of the AACS. The New England association also has a goodly membership including many who are active members of the AACS.

Mr. Oscar F. Burbank president of the New England association in a recent letter says: "The New England Association has been responsible for a great deal of work which has been very helpful to cemetery men as well as to the general public. Not the least of the services rendered have been with relation to needed legislation. One of the best features of the Association, to my mind, is the fact that members are ready at all times to assist other members to obtain facts necessary to the efficient operation of their various cemeteries.  Therein the very essence of the association idea is expressed.

Mr. Painter and Mr. Jones with the assistance of other AACS members in Pennsylvania, or organized an association in that state. Its principal work has been to direct attention to and aid in defeating pernicious legislation, in which it has been successful. Far-reaching, through the influence of this Association has been, it must continue to widen, until, through its efforts, every state in the Union has seen the wisdom of having laws that will insure adequate provision for the permanent care of cemeteries and that will also protect the credulous and gullible public against the why schemes of promoters and speculators who promise fabulous returns from investments in cemetery projects.

Here lies a most potent reason for establishing local clubs and state associations. There is no surer way of spreading the gospel of better cemeteries and of arousing public sentiment when the necessity arises, against get-rich-quick propositions of this kind. The fact that state organizations have failed in some cases should not be allowed to discourage further action. The more the AACS does in this way, the more will its own strength increase and its ability to do good be multiplied. Every convention of this Association should give impetus to the organization of associations of this character until they become nation wide.

There are persons who prefer earth burial, others who regard it as abhorrent, and consider sepulture in vaults or mausoleums the only way to inter the dead, and still others who will have neither of these methods when cremation is possible. Cemeteries, therefore, which are prepared to give the public what it wants and to do it in the most acceptable manner usually, find favor. Personal prejudices should not deter a cemetery from fulfilling its rightful mission. When the AACS was organized there were but six crematoriums in this country; today there are eighty or more and nearly half of them are located in cemeteries. Each year marks additions to the number of crematoriums at cemeteries; several are now under process of construction, and others are in contemplation. The Association has never gone on record in favor of this method of disposing of the dead. It is a fact, nevertheless, that many of its members approve of it and are members of the Cremation Society of America, an organization which deserves the cooperation of all who believe in cremation. The subject of cremation has been discussed at conventions of this Association-it is one that might profitably be considered from time to time, for the benefit of those who should be thoroughly informed, as well as to remove some of the mistaken ideas that have retarded its progress. Cremation is more popular on the Pacific Coast than elsewhere in the US. Los Angeles and its environs has seven crematoriums, and there are five in San Francisco and nearby towns.

It seems almost incredible that eleven years ago automobiles were excluded from a number of cemeteries whose superintendents are on record to that effect. The transition that has come in the meantime, in conducting funerals, and the constant development of air travel, also the broadcasting of all manner of services, give one visions of funeral parties being transported by airplane, and funeral services disseminated by radio. When that time comes, metropolitan cemeteries will have sections set apart for landing stations for the accommodation of their lot owners who arrive by airplanes and chapels will be equipped with radio broadcasting apparatus. A funeral by airplane has already taken place in Chicago. Three planes were in the cortege that recently paid tribute to a captain whose ashes were dropped into the waters of Lake Michigan.

While this Association has had no special axe to grind, and has, therefore, given but little attention to the matter of newspaper publicity it cannot be said to have received the degree of publicity to which an organization of its importance in public affairs is rightfully entitled. Possibly this is due to the fact of its having no duly authorized press agent. The Association manages to get into the spot light about once a year during the annual conventions when newspaper reporters who are assigned to the hotels give the public a glimpse of its activities in a story often times as pain fully abbreviated as the most modern bathing costume. Most persons seem loath to think or speak of cemeteries until the subject is forced upon them. Members of this Association can greatly assist in changing the attitude of the public mind regarding cemeteries by supplying their local newspapers with items of public interest. Excerpts from some of the excellent papers that have been read at your conventions would be published by the editors of your home papers if they were given the opportunity.

The subjects discussed in papers and question box have run the entire gamut of things pertaining to cemeteries, from bugs, birds and beetles, to reptiles, roads and the most radical rules and yet, like that famous biblical story, "the half has not been told," nor will it until every cemetery in this country has felt the refining Influence of this Association.

Between sessions, congenial spirits have hob-nobbed and swapped experiences, and of these occasions every one of the older members has pleasant memories. The dream of a certain superintendent which points a moral is timely. "I dreamed that I had died", said this certain man "and to my dismay, I found the elevator going down instead of up. On arriving at my destination, which was decidedly tropical as far as temperature was concerned I was registered and questioned as to my vocation on earth. When his Satanic Majesty heard I had been a cemetery Superintendent he remarked, “I have a very interesting department to show you”. He proceeded to escort me to a compartment above the doors of which I read the words Cemetery Superintendents and Officials and informed me this was where the kun-drying was done. “Why do you need such a place?” I asked. “Why” remarked “His Majesty, this is where we have to put the cemetery men who did not join the Association of American Cemetery Superintendents, they are so green they won't burn.” I saw my finish and wakened in a cold sweat. The next morning my application for membership in the AACS was on its way to Mr. Jones.

This Association has numbered among its honorary and active members men distinguished in various walks of life, at least two of whom deserve mention. The Rt. Rev. Bishop McQuaid, of Rochester, NY, whose presence at Rochester in 1903 was an inspiration, was unquestionably among the first Catholic clergymen to take the initiative in bettering the condition of Catholic cemeteries. Mr. Charles M. Loring, president of Lakewood Cemetery Association, Minneapolis, who died recently at an advanced aged, was one of that city's most distinguished citizens. He was president of the first Board of Park Commissioners of that city, and did much to promote the planting of trees there and elsewhere.

With the passing of the weeping willow, the impossible lamb, the attenuated slab, and the variegated forms of lot enclosures, we cannot fail, to note the infrequency of the tombstone that "could stand up and at the same time lie on its face" with such ineffable complacence. The days of the quaint epitaph truly have passed. Do you realize, gentlemen, that in bringing about a changed condition you have deprived some visitors of one of their chief joys? At the Richmond, VA, convention of this Association in 1893, one of the memorable places visited was St. John's church and churchyard. There we were permitted to stand where Patrick Henry delivered his famous address. In the graveyard one epitaph fixed itself indelibly in my mind. It ran: "Remember friends as you pass by, as you are now, so once was I, as I am now, so must you be, prepare for death and follow me." It was that which followed, however, that made the lasting impression. A wag had written under the epitaph these words:  "To follow you I would not be content, unless I knew which way you went."

Professor Bailey paid a very high compliment to the AACS when he classed it as "one of three national societies conserving the landscape gardening and rural art of the country." Yet cannot something still greater be said in its favor when we consider the absolutely unselfish motive that brought together its founders to organize an association whose object "shall be the advancement of the interests and the elevation of the character of cemeteries in America"? For thirty-five years these men and their successors have met in annual convention to carry out their high purpose with never a thought of personal financial gain; without the slightest suspicion of graft and without any emolument or salary whatever, to any officer excepting the utterly inadequate remuneration paid the Secretary-Treasurer. The men who have brought this Association to its present high standard are amply qualified to speak with authority on all practical and ethical matters pertaining to cemetery management. With many of them it has been the study of a lifetime, and out of their actual experience they are giving freely to all who choose to attend their annual conventions.
The bane of many associations is the tendency to form cliques: its absence in this Association is cause for genuine congratulation. This real spirit of democracy of which have been born ties of warmest friendship, should never be allowed to wane.

Theodore Roosevelt said: "Every man owes some of his time to up-building of the profession to which he belongs." It was that very principle which actuated the founders of this Association, and has been preeminent in all of its deliberations.

The talented men who organized and carried forward to success the Association of American Cemetery Superintendents have immortalized themselves in their profession by raising the cemeteries of America to their present high standard and earning for themselves an everlasting debt of gratitude from the public.

This cursory glance at the activities of the Association would surely be incomplete without allusion to the part women are taking in the improvement of cemeteries as well as to the inspiration of their presence at the conventions. They have played a most important part in the always delightful social functions, and have on several occasions made valuable contributions to the program. Landscape gardening as a profession, has a natural appeal to women as a vocation, and is so closely allied to cemeteries that women are finding here, as they are elsewhere, new and not inappropriate fields of activity.

All hail to the men and women who have helped the Association of American Cemetery Superintendents reach its high peak! May their tribe increase!

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 36th Annual Convention
Omaha, Nebraska
September 18, 19, 20 and 21, 1922

It would seem to approach the realm of presumption on my part if I were to come before an association like this with the purpose of presenting anything new in the matter of research or invention in cemetery work.  To an association of thirty-five years standing holding an annual convention for study and discussion there must surely be for you, nothing new under the sun in the matter of cemetery development.

When I found the task of this subject assigned me and went apart to spend a few vacation hours in meditation, I discovered that literally interpreted, it called for an attempt to do what had been done many times over in the previous sessions of your conventions. It was so hard to find a starting point that I felt very much in the position that Pat found his friend Mike, after a few years sojourn in this country. They came out from the "auld sod" together. Both of them had been thoroughly trained in the religious faith of the church. Soon after their arrival in this land, circumstances parted them and each started to work his way in the new world. Pat remained true to the faith of his fathers but Mike fell on evil ways and drifted into infidelity and unbelief. In the course of time, the Death Angel reaped and Mike was cut off. His last request was that word be sent to his friend Pat, who hastened to him but only in time to find his old companion laid out in his best suit of clothes in his coffin ready for burial. As he gazed upon the face of his friend his emotion burst into exclamation. "Poor Mike! He didn't believe in God and he didn't believe in the devil. Poor Mike! He didn't believe in heaven and he didn't believe in hell. Poor Mike! He is all dressed up and has no where to go".

I found the subject as outlined on the program, so large and with so many ramifications anyone of which would be worthy the time of a special paper that I am taking the liberty of making the terminal facilities of this paper easier by confining myself to the subject of Modern Cemetery Making Some Reflex Influences and Observations."

What I say will be from the standpoint of one outside the office of Superintendent yet of one who is sympathetically interested in the work of your Association. This interest has been intensified by an extended experience associated as a stockholder and director in the development and management of at least two City cemeteries and also in the work of reorganizing several neglected rural cemeteries. I am also encouraged in addressing you by the thought that the chief function of a paper at a convention like this is not so much the presentation of new and unheard of material as it is to provide a fulcrum around which fruitful discussion may revolve.

A few observations of the reflex influence of your work may serve to hearten any of you who are met by serious discouragement in your work and perhaps are debating in your own mind as to whether what you are doing in the world is really worth while.  I would like to assure you with more than ordinary emphasis that the work that you are doing through the auspices of this Association of American Superintendents is worthy a place among the fine-arts in the realm of education. The work which this association is accomplishing and has already accomplished in conserving and improving the landscape and in the encouragement of rural art is of the highest value in promoting aesthetic culture throughout the land.

And I want also to assure you that yours would still be a worthy work if you accomplished nothing more than what you have already accomplished by developing your park system of cemeteries, in providing places of refuge for the preservation of bird life. At the annual rate of destruction of our natural groves and woods for the purpose merely of material gain, the cemetery parks dotted over the countryside are timely substitutes for these in supplying important places of refuge for the encouragement of bird migration and reproduction; those indispensable friends of mankind which not only add joy to life by their presence but are such a large economic asset in the destruction of insect pests. Yours is a twofold opportunity in this respect. You are not only developing cemetery parks that are sanctuaries for the repose of the honored dead, but incidentally these parks are also sanctuaries of the living plumage so necessary to our well being.

Another reflex of the work your association is doing is seen in the matter of rural community betterment and is associated with the work of reorganizing neglected burial grounds, and it appears to me that there is a splendid opportunity in your association to conduct a special work along this line with a special department giving expert direction and supervision to this particular work.

That the character of a community and its cemetery often bear a close relation to each other might at first thought seem a strained statement; but in a life's work spent toward the end of community uplift and rural betterment, the speaker has found that the spiritual, moral and social status of a community frequently reflects itself in the local cemetery. A personal reminiscence will serve as an illustration. Some years ago while serving in one of our home mission fields. I was assigned a territory about fifty miles square. I was proceeding for the first time toward a small village settlement at the extreme of the field to conduct Sunday Evening Worship and take a preliminary survey. Speeding along on horse-back through wooded trails, I suddenly emerged into the open with the village close in sight. I turned onto a by-path which made a short cut from the main trail into the town when suddenly my horse stumbled and I was thrown from the saddle. I recovered myself and my horse and looking for an explanation I saw where the path had broken away into some loose soil. A sweep of the eye disclosed in the gloaming sunset a half-fenced enclosure, a few irregular mounds and fewer still, reclining headstones. The loose soil into which my horse stumbled was a freshly filled grave. The whole area was a commons overrun by the cattle and the swine of the village. This was the village cemetery, the sanctuary for the burial of their dead. As these facts dawned upon me, forebodings of the work to be done took possession of my being and what I afterwards discovered of leadership in that place justified my forebodings.

I will present to you four types of character which were the most influential in shaping the life of that community and whose character was reflected in their cemetery. The first type represented its professional leadership. At my first service in the little neglected chapel of this village, a grimy individual with germy hands and dope-set eyes acted as chief official and passed his hat for the offering. At the conclusion of the service, he introduced himself as the village doctor. His mentality may be judged from this conversation. He was voluntarily discussing the recent death of a patient in technical terms that I feared neither he nor I understood. I said to him, "Doctor, I do not quite understand. Could you tell me in plain English the exact cause of her death?" "Well," he said, "to sum it all up, she died from the complete loss of the power of life." I told him that I quite understood him now.

The second type represented the educational leadership in the person of the village teacher. She was a tall, angular, stoical, maiden who had already been responsible for educating two generations and who was still doing the same things always in the same way and whose habit of reading never extended beyond the text books she daily handled before the class.

A firm of two brothers represented the industrial type of leadership. They owned the only industry in the form of a planing mill. It was equipped with a worn out engine and a planer. It took two hours to get up steam enough to operate and after running for two hours, they were compelled to shut down again in order to get a fresh head of steam for another start.

The last represents the moral type of that community. When I was about to leave the chapel after my first Sunday evening visit a young man who was lingering about the church door approached me and hesitatingly said, "Say, Parson, can you baptize and bury people?" I answered that I was ordained for that mission. "Well", he replied, "I want to get married." I performed that service for him the following week. It was just a month later when the same young man was waiting for me again at the chapel door. "Well Jack," I said, "What is on your mind this time? And quite unabashed, he inquired, "Say, Parson when can you plan to baptize our baby?" Thus a decadent community reflected itself in its neglected cemetery.

In organizing a work of rural uplift in a community of this type, the social worker can usually find a starting point for a universal appeal toward cooperative effort in the matter of the improvement of the local cemetery and I know of communities which have been awakened to many lines of helpful activity through the forming of a cemetery association.

That there is a need for work in many places along the line of cemetery reorganization can plainly be seen by a casual survey of the whole field of cemetery operation. For the purpose of this survey, cemeteries might be classed under four heads:
 
1. Business corporations having an eye to dividend production.
2. Association controlled and non-dividend.
3. Municipally controlled.
4. Church controlled.

Someone has observed that these might further be classified under organized, reorganized and disorganized. Some are examples of good management while others are samples of quiescent non-management. Many municipally controlled cemeteries especially in larger centers are well managed while in some of the townships, they are the victims in management of the worst roustabout the town shelters. The tendency to lift these from the realm of political management by transferring them to non-political associations seems to lead to a better and more economic administration.

Many church owned cemeteries, likewise, are under good management while the neglect of many others is coincident with the decline of the rural church. These might best be improved through the forming of a community association. Many of these cemeteries decline because of the presence of a well organized city cemetery within easy reach. The advantage of perpetual care is causing many removals that will eventually deplete them and their usefulness will cease.

To reorganize or make modern any existing cemetery is a matter of varied approach. In attempting this process, one immediately meets a variety of obstacles including indifference to higher ideals, prejudice against any change, political antagonism, legal difficulties, lack of finances, or experienced management or proper records, etc. All these must be overcome with patience according to the local circumstances. To aid this end, an educational propaganda must be instituted to arouse a public consciousness favorable to the change.

Next, a study of the laws of the particular state must be in order that a properly organized association may be formed and the lands of old cemeteries legally transferred.

The problem of finance usually looms up very large. The success of this must depend on the initiative of the leaders. The permanent revenue usually comes from the sale of lots supplemented by municipal grants and other means. It is necessary also to establish a permanent up-keep fund if permanency is to be assured. This may not be such a difficult problem as appears on the surface. In dealing with this problem recently, the writer knows of a community where a number of citizens came voluntarily and pledged in bequests from $100 to $1000 each, toward such a fund. A complete canvass will provide for this fund a start toward a fair endowment. Another possibility for aid toward this fund would be to educate lot holders to invest in this fund a goodly percent of the amount they would otherwise spend for monuments. An important point to make clear and insist upon is that bequests for this fund are not to be used solely for individual graves but should go into a common fund for upkeep of the whole cemetery.

The problem of management for a superintendent is of final importance. If no one with previous experience is available for this office, then someone with foresight and hindsight and the ability and desire to learn must be chosen and given every needed encouragement and help for the task. By such an effort, a strong organization through patience and devotion may eventually come to pass.

Before concluding, I would like to have said some things on "The Making of a Modern Cemetery" as a scientific process of modern art but, as I stated at the beginning of this paper there are so many departments that the work of these is best presented by the specialists who are working in these departments. I venture the observation, however, that the type of cemetery which best works out this ideal is a business corporation based on strict business administration. Successful business competition demands the highest type of efficient management and careful development from every standpoint.

I conclude by again assuring you as an observer from the outside, that the work you are doing through your association fills a large place in the nation's welfare.
 

From the publication:
AACS - Proceedings of the 35th Annual Convention
Detroit, Michigan
September 13, 14 and 15, 1921