Gravely Speaking

An oil lamp is the centerpiece of the stained-glass window in the Fisher Family Mausoleum in the Allegheny Cemetery in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The oil lamp hangs from the ceiling and is flanked by fluted Neo-classic pilasters.  A flickering flame billowing shades of blue and gray smoke provides hues of yellow to the window.

The oil lamp is not an uncommon symbol found in cemeteries and is recreated as bas-relief sculptures in stone, bronze sculptures, and here in stained glass.  For Christians meaning is found in many Bible verses:

II Samuel: Chapter 22, verse 29, says, “For thou art my lamp, O LORD: and the LORD will lighten my darkness.”

Psalms 119:105: “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.”

John 8:12: “Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.”

The light emanating from the lamp represents the pathway to Truth and to Knowledge and also represents Christ as the Light of the World.

The long slender stained-glass window in the Allegheny Cemetery in Pittsburgh, displays a crown and cross in a purple quatrefoil. The quatrefoil in Christian symbolism represents the four evangelists—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—and is often found in the tracery of Gothic Churches. 

Even the color of the glass surrounding the motif is significant.  Purple was the color that signified royal authority.  It also represents the suffering and mourning associated with the Passion of Christ. During the Passion of Christ, Roman soldiers placed a purple robe around Jesus and crowned him with thorns mocking Him. The color purple is also a reminder to Christians of Jesus’s suffering and their need to confess their sins and seek forgiveness.

The crown is a symbol of glory and victory over death.  The reward awaits in Heaven where the victor will receive a crown of victory. The cross represents the suffering of Christ and is a universal symbol of Christianity.

Often the inside of a mausoleum is more impressive than the exterior displaying sculptures and stained-glass windows that are not readily accessible to be viewed. The window shown here displays a woman in white robes cradling a dove in her hands. 

There are several references in the Bible that refer to the dove as a symbol of the Holy Spirit. Matthew 3:16 reads, “And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him.” 

In Mark 1:10 the Bible says, “And Straightway coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens opened, and the Spirit like a dove descending upon him.” Again in John 1:32, the Bible reads, “And John bare record, saying, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him.” 

However, along with the dove symbolizing the Holy Spirit, the dove is also closely associated with peace, often depicted with a sprig of an olive in its beak. This, too, originated in the Bible. After the waters receded in the story of Noah, the dove appears. Genesis 8:11, “And the dove came in to him in the evening; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf pluckt off; so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth.”  It was viewed as a sign of God’s forgiveness.  Though the dove does not have an olive sprig in its beak in this representation, the ribbon with “PEACE” emblazoned at the bottom of the window gives away the meaning here.

As is often the case, symbols not only have a religious meaning but often share a secular one, as well.  The mourning figure above is draped in white robes and the white dove with the color white typically associated with the virtues of purity and innocence. 

Here Lies

PEGGY GUGGENHEIM

1898 – 1979

HERE LIE MY BELOVED BABIES

CAPPUCINO 1949 – 1953

PEGEEN 1951 – 1953

PEACOCK 1952 – 1953

TORO 1954 – 1957

FOGLIA 1956 – 1958

MADAM BUTTERFLY 1954 – 1958

BABY 1949 – 1959

EMILY 1945 – 1960

WHITE ANGEL 1945 – 1960

SIR HERBERT 1952 – 1965

SABLE 1958 – 1973

GYPSY 1961 – 1975

HONG KONG 1964 – 1978

CELLIDA 1964 – 1979

Marguerite Guggenheim, known as Peggy, was born into great wealth in New York City, the middle daughter of Benjamin Guggenheim and Florette Silegman Guggenheim.  The Guggenheim family made their fortune mining and smelting metals.  The Silegman’s were bankers.  Peggy’s father, Benjamin, was tragically lost on the Titanic.

Peggy married Laurence Vail and had two children—Sinbad and Pegeen.  The marriage ended in divorce and she married again to Max Ernst.  This marriage also ended in divorce.

Peggy was the quintessential collector of modern art and opened a series of art galleries in her lifetime—in Paris, New York, and the last of which was in her home, the Palazzo Venier dei Leoni, located on Venice’s Grand Canal. 

She made her collection her life’s work.  She wrote of herself, “I am not a collector, I am a museum.” And during her life, she was indeed a museum, opening her home to visitors three days a week to share her impressive collection of modern artworks by artists such as Max Ernst, Picasso, Alexander Calder, Vasily Kandinsky, and Jackson Pollock, among others. 

After her death on December 23, 1979, her home became a permanent art gallery and her final resting place.  Her ashes, along with the ashes of her 14 dogs, were buried in a quiet corner of her garden at the Palazzo.

Benjamin Franklin Jones

August 8, 1824 – May 19, 1903

Mary McMasters Jones

March 13, 1829 – January 11, 1911

On the front of the Jones Family Mausoleum in the Allegheny Cemetery in Pittsburgh are two Neo-classic female figures in flowing Roman or Greek robes.  The woman on the left holds an open book while the figure on the right has a closed book in her lap and one hand on a palm front and a wreath. 

The open book likely represents the Bible.  The other figure looks downward with one hand she holds a palm frond.  The palm frond is an ancient symbol of victory, dating back to Roman times when victors were presented with palm fronds. The palm fronds were also laid in the path of Jesus as He entered Jerusalem. So, for many Christians, the palm represents righteousness, resurrection, and martyrdom, symbolizing the spiritual victory over death associated with the Easter story.  On her lap rest a closed book which most likely indicates a completed life.  Between the two women rests a wreath.  The wreath is round—a completed circle—symbolizing eternity.  A laurel wreath represents victory over death and dates back again to Roman times.

This motif has been found on the following monuments.

May “Mollie” Cash Neal

Born 1844, Louisiana

Died October 1894, aged 49-50

Mary Elizabeth “Lizzie” Neal

Born 1867, Louisiana

Died June 17, 1889, aged 21-22

The monument in the historic Oakland Cemetery in Atlanta of two women sitting next two each other was thought to be carved to represent a mother and a daughter.  The sculpture on the left is thought to represent May “Mollie” Neal, wife of Captain Thomas Benton Neal (born October 21, 1838, Pike County, Georgia—Died April 12,1902, aged 63, Fulton County, Georgia).

This monument is not an original—that is there are others that look similar, like the Frank and Mary Lang monument in the Fairview Cemetery in New Albany, Indiana.  The white marble monument is weathered and worn but is unmistakably the same.

Asleep in Jesus, blessed thought.

In memory of

Frank Lang

Died March 26, 1892

Aged 80 years

Mary C. his wife

Aged 77 years.

Philip Morris

1855 – August 24, 1907

Elizabeth Disston Morris

1881- 1956

The Morris monument in the Lakeview Cemetery in Cleveland, Ohio.

ROBERT PAUL Jr.

WAS A PRIVATE OF CO. A. 13^TH PA. VOL.

INFANTRY 3 MONTHS SERVICE,

HELPED ORGANIZE AND ENLISTED

IN HAMPTON BATTERY F. PA.

LIGHT ARTILLERY OCT. 8^TH 1861 AND

WAS ENGAGED IN EVERY BATTLE THE

BATTERY WAS IN DURING THE WAR.

HONORABLY DISCHARGED

JAN. 3^RD 1865 AS

FIRST LIEUTENANT.

DIED SEPT. 11^TH 1905.

The soaring light gray granite obelisk marks the grave of Robert Paul Jr.’s grave.  The front of the monument is embellished with a bronze shield that details his service during the Civil War.  The two sides of the monument are further indications of his military service. 

On one side at two crossed rifles with a canteen and shoulder bag laid over a laurel wreath.  The rifles likely memorialize Paul’s duty in the Pennsylvania Infantry. The laurel wreath in the motif is an ancient Roman symbol of victory in war.

On the other side of the monument are two crossed cannons—again laid over a laurel wreath.  The cannons are a tribute to his time in the Hampton Battery, a light artillery unit. In between the cannons is a clover which is a nod to Paul’s Irish heritage and birth.

ADAM JACKSON

Born about 1862 in England

Died March 25, 1910, Bloomington, Indiana

At first glance the small limestone gravestone in Section E in the Rose Hill Cemetery in Bloomington, Indiana, looks like it was sculpted for a small child, maybe even an infant.  But at closer inspection, what at first looked like a child’s coffin is carved to resemble a stonecutter’s toolbox, complete with hinges on the back and handles on the sides for easy lifting.  The final clue is the chisel carved on the base of the gravestone, indicating the profession of the deceased person’s occupation—stonecutter.

The only other clue to who lay beneath the stone is the initial “A.” and the last name “JACKSON.”  A quick look in the cemetery files indicates that an A. Jackson was buried in the Rose Hill Cemetery and that he died March 1, 1910.  A search of deaths in Monroe County turned up an Adam Jackson who had been treated for pneumonia for about five days before he succumbed and died March 25, 1910, in Bloomington.  There was a small discrepancy in his date of death but that is not uncommon. Mr. Jackson was born in England in about 1862.  His occupation was listed as stonecutter just as his gravestone indicates.

GENERAL ALEXANDER HAYES

KILLED IN THE BATTLE OF

THE WILDERNESS

MAY THE 5^TH 1864.

BORN JULY THE 8^TH 1819.

THIS MONUMENT WAS ERECTED

BY THE SOLDIERS OF HIS COMMAND

This monument is topped with an eagle standing on a flag-draped sarcophagus.  An eagle often represents the Fraternal Order of Eagles, but in this case the eagle connotes service in the military. 

West Point graduate Hayes served with distinction in two wars—the Mexican American War and the Civil War.  According to Images of America: Allegheny Cemetery, published by Arcadia Publishing, written by Lisa Speranza and Nancy Foley, page 55, Hayes was “promoted twice for gallantry in the Civil War, Hayes was severely injured at Second Bull Run and largely responsible for repulsing Pickett’s Charge at Gettysburg.”  General Hayes was leading his troops at the Battle of the Wilderness, when a “sniper’s bullet found his head, killing him instantly.”

The men of his command erected this monument which President Ulysses Grant, who became friends with Hayes at West Point and served with him during the Civil War, visited his grave and “circling the monument in contemplative silence, … sat upon an inverted cannon and openly wept.” 

On the plinth, reads the following stanza which is the second quatrain from the poem “Bivouac of the Dead” by Theodore O’Hara. The poem was written to mourn the war dead from the Mexican American War and gained popularity during the Civil War:

On Fame’s eternal camping-ground
Their silent tents are spread,
And Glory guards, with solemn round,
The bivouac of the dead.

The full poem:

“BIVOUAC OF THE DEAD”

The muffled drum’s sad roll has beat
The soldier’s last tattoo;
No more on life’s parade shall meet
That brave and fallen few.

On Fame’s eternal camping-ground
Their silent tents are spread,
And Glory guards, with solemn round,
The bivouac of the dead.

No rumor of the foe’s advance
Now swells upon the wind;
Nor troubled thought at midnight haunts
Of loved ones left behind;

No vision of the morrow’s strife
The warrior’s dream alarms;
No braying horn nor screaming fife
At dawn shall call to arms.

Their shriveled swords are red with rust,
Their plumed heads are bowed,
Their haughty banner, trailed in dust,
Is now their martial shroud.

And plenteous funeral tears have washed
The red stains from each brow,
And the proud forms, by battle gashed
Are free from anguish now.

The neighing troop, the flashing blade,
The bugle’s stirring blast,
The charge, the dreadful cannonade,
The din and shout, are past;

Nor war’s wild note nor glory’s peal
Shall thrill with fierce delight
Those breasts that nevermore may feel
The rapture of the fight.

Like the fierce northern hurricane
That sweeps the great plateau,
Flushed with the triumph yet to gain,
Came down the serried foe,

Who heard the thunder of the fray
Break o’er the field beneath,
Knew well the watchword of that day
Was “Victory or death!”

Long had the doubtful conflict raged
O’er all that stricken plain,
For never fiercer fight had waged
The vengeful blood of Spain;

And still the storm of battle blew,
Still swelled the gory tide;
Not long, our stout old chieftain knew,
Such odds his strength could bide.

Twas in that hour his stern command
Called to a martyr’s grave
The flower of his beloved land,
The nation’s flag to save.

By rivers of their father’s gore
His first-born laurels grew,
And well he deemed the sons would pour
Their lives for glory too.

For many a mother’s breath has swept
O’er Angostura’s plain —
And long the pitying sky has wept
Above its moldered slain.

The raven’s scream, or eagle’s flight,
Or shepherd’s pensive lay,
Alone awakes each sullen height
That frowned o’er that dread fray.

Sons of the Dark and Bloody Ground
Ye must not slumber there,
Where stranger steps and tongues resound
Along the heedless air.

Your own proud land’s heroic soil
Shall be your fitter grave;
She claims from war his richest spoil —
The ashes of her brave.

Thus ‘neath their parent turf they rest,
Far from the gory field,
Borne to a Spartan mother’s breast
On many a bloody shield;

The sunshine of their native sky
Smiles sadly on them here,
And kindred eyes and hearts watch by
The heroes sepulcher.

Rest on embalmed and sainted dead!
Dear as the blood ye gave;
No impious footstep shall here tread
The herbage of your grave;

Nor shall your glory be forgot
While fame her records keeps,
Or Honor points the hallowed spot
Where Valor proudly sleeps.

Yon marble minstrel’s voiceless stone
In deathless song shall tell,
When many a vanquished ago has flown,
The story how ye fell;

Nor wreck, nor change, nor winter’s blight,
Nor Time’s remorseless doom,
Shall dim one ray of glory’s light
That gilds your deathless tomb.

GRANT WOOD

1891-1942

NAN GRAHAM WOOD

1899-1990

BYRON H. McKEEBY

1867—1950

Few paintings in American history have the power to create a tourist attraction but that is exactly what American Gothic has done for the very small Iowa town of Eldon.

Eldon is the home of the small house built by the Dibble family between 1881 and 1882, which became the backdrop for one of the most famous and most parodied paintings in America, if not the world.  

The house caught Grant Wood’s eye because of the pointed-arch window which was likely purchased from a Sears catalog and built in the mid-19^th century architectural Carpenter Gothic style—hence the name of the painting—American Gothic.  Wood thought the Gothic-style window on the modest farmhouse looked pretentious. 

According to a placard at what is now a museum that maintains the house and features details about the artist and the famous painting, “The style grew out of a need for quickly built homes and a desire for fanciful details.  The price to add these details to wood-framed structures decreased significantly during this period, so even modest homes were able to incorporate extra elements.

Now tourists visiting the American Gothic House Museum, take turns renting the costumes that resemble what Nan Wood, Grant wood’s sister, and his dentist, Dr. Byron McKeeby, are wearing in the famous painting.  My wife and I couldn’t resist—we donned the attire, too! 

The pair in the painting are Grant’s image of a father and daughter who he imagined might have lived in the farmhouse behind them, though most think the painting is of a farm couple. 

Grant Wood and his sister, Nan, are buried in the Riverside Cemetery at Anamosa, Iowa. Dr. Byron McKeeby is buried in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, at the Oak Hill Cemetery.

JOHN THEOBOLD WEYBRECHT

BORN IN ALSACE, FRANCE JANUARY 27^TH 1829.

DIED AT ALLIANCE, OHIO JANUARY 31^ST, 1895. 

KNOW TO THIS COMMUNITY FOR FORTY YEARS

AS A USEFUL CITIZEN AND HONEST MAN

The towering granite Weybrecht monument in the Alliance City Cemetery in Alliance, Ohio, is imbued with symbolism starting at the very top. Often, urns are found on top of columns.  The urn, of course, is a container used to hold the ashes or the cremated remains of the dead.  In this case, the urn is draped.  The drapery can represent a shroud symbolizing death and sorrow, or can be a motif that represents a veil that separates the Earthly and Heavenly realms.  The urn was an almost ubiquitous 19th Century symbol found in nearly every American cemetery. 

The irony is that very few people were cremated during the 19th Century when the draped urn motif was at the height of its popularity.  For instance, during the eight years from 1876 until 1884, only 41 Americans were cremated.  David Charles Sloane writes in his book, Is the Cemetery Dead? pages10-11, “in 1960, fewer than 5 percent of dead Americans were cremated.  Most were buried or entombed in cemeteries after religious services.  By 2015, a larger percentage of the dead were cremated (roughly 48 percent)…Projections suggest this trend will only escalate, perhaps to 70 percent cremated by 2030”.

Lower on the monument is a laurel wreath tied neatly with a ribbon.  The laurel wreath dates back to Roman times when soldiers wore them as triumphal signs of glory.  The laurel was also believed to wash away the soldier’s guilt from injuring or killing any of his opponents.  In funerary art the laurel wreath is often seen as a symbol of victory over death.

But, the focal point of the monument, between the columns with the composite capitals is a cartouche with a bronze medallion containing the portrait of John Theobold Weybrecht and an inscription that details his birth, death, and virtue as a citizen and a man.  

The bas-relief or low-relief of Weybrecht was sculpted by Ohio artist Ora Coltman (December 3, 1858 – July 2, 1940).  Coltman was a painter, as well as a sculptor. The difficulty in creating a flattened sculpture of a face is giving it a three-dimensional look and feel and capturing the visual qualities of the man.  Coltman’s talent is clear.