647 
PARK AND CEMETERY. 
building was of Bedford stone of a very 
poor grade, and much discolored before the 
building was completed. The other parts 
of the building were not far enough ad- 
vanced to form much of an opinion. 
Their next visit was to Aurora, 111. At 
Spring Lake Cemetery they were informed 
that the mausoleum company had been re- 
fused permission to build. Failing in that 
cemetery they purchased in Montgomery 
Cemetery, which is a small country burying 
ground, and built a mausoleum which, to 
use the committee’s own words, is “very 
poorly constructed and the design is very 
crude.” The exterior is of cement blocks 
so poor that they had to be treated with 
some kind of an exterior wash or coating. 
The next community mausoleum visited 
was at Toledo, Ohio. This is described as 
being of a very grotesque appearance and 
not fit for any cemetery. It is located on 
land of their own outside of any ceme- 
tery boundary. 
In the Brooklyn Heights Cemetery, at 
Cleveland, Ohio, was found what seemed 
to be the best deal, from the cemetery 
man's standpoint, that the mausoleum com- 
pany had made. The committee make no 
comment on the building, but state that 
the mausoleum company paid GO cents a 
foot for the land, $12.50 per catacomb for 
permanent care, and 30 catacombs for the 
use of the cemetery for a receiving vault. 
They visited many other cities, and found 
cemetery men in general opposed to these 
public mausoleums. 
There are several good cemeteries that 
have allowed these buildings erected. What 
will be their position as regards these 
buildings fifty years from now? We will 
presume, like the Cleveland cemetery, that 
they got their price for the land, and that 
this Includes reasonable care such as cutting 
the grass, etc. It is not far-fetched to 
presume that the time will come when the 
annual outlay for replacements will be con- 
siderable. As the cemetery has no financial 
Interest in the building, will they let it go 
to ruin or will they repair it? If they 
repair it, who will pay the bills? There 
will be few, if any, catacomb owners left. 
It must be understood these are the real 
owners of the building, but, being dead, 
they cannot pay any bills. It then resolves 
itself into the fact that the cemetery must 
do repairs for little or nothing or allow 
the building to become unsightly, and 
greatly depreciate the value of the other 
property of the cemetery. 
Mr. Hood is the authority for the state- 
ment that the mausoleum company had 
purchased ground not in any cemetery but 
adjacent to Chicago for these mausoleums. 
If this is true, I again ask the question, 
what will be the result in fifty years from 
now? I will presume that as Chicago is a 
very large city the mausoleum company 
could construct buildings to hold 1,000 cat- 
acombs each. I will also presume that in 
the future the mausoleum company will be 
very much more liberal as to funds for per- 
petual care, and will set aside as much as 
$25 per catacomb. This will make a fund 
of $25,000, which at 4 per cent will bring 
in $1,000 a year. Now it must be borne 
in mind that these buildings will not be 
in a cemetery, and there will be no ceme- 
tery association to give janitor service, 
keep the grounds in order, open and close 
catacombs, and do the many small neces- 
sary things that will have to be done. It 
will take all of this $1,000 for this serv- 
ice. Where is money to come from for 
repairs, etc. ? I will leave that for others 
to answer, as I cannot. 
As I prepared this paper I had before 
me a copy of the Illinois State Register of 
.Springfield, dated November 21, 1910. The 
International Mausoleum Co. had a two- 
page write-up. They show the tombs of 
Menelukes. Rachel, Absalom, Lazarus, Jo- 
seph and David. In this write-up the per- 
manence of tomb burial is dwelt upon. 
The pictures are striking examples of the 
falsity of their statements. Each is a 
mass of ruins, and historic associations con- 
nected with these is all that has preserved 
what is left of them. 
If I should undertake to answer all the 
assertions in this paper I could take up the 
entire time of this convention. 
Before I finish, however, I would like to 
answer a statement made at our last meet- 
ing by Mr. Austin. He said one member 
(meaning myself) stated cement fence posts 
would last forever; why not cement mau- 
soleums? Cement concrete is all right 
when well made, but they have not always 
done this well. The worst fact is that 
many of these cement buildings have iron 
doors and iron frames for the roof; in 
some cases iron roller curtains are used in 
place of doors, and in one of their pub- 
lished specifications “Sacket’s plaster board 
is specified on 2x4 pieces between I-beams.” 
At least one of their best buildings is 
veneered with glazed brick, which is far 
from being fit for a mortuary building sup- 
posed to last forever. 
The object of this paper is not to attack 
the International or any other mausoleum 
company, but give cemetery officials some- 
thing to think of as to permanence. It 
may not be out of place here to say that 
the whole mausoleum subject, both private 
and community, is one that should have 
the most serious consideration of cemetery 
officials. There has not been enough ear- 
nest thought, and consequently very little 
action along that line. I have said some- 
thing about endowments or lack of endow- 
ments. It is not half of what could be 
said, but the whole subject can be summed 
up in one sentence, viz., mausoleums of 
any kind should be well and amply en- 
dowed. 
Prom the foregoing some of my hearers 
will say that I am opposed to mausoleums. 
Personally I do not like them. To my mind 
there is nothing so secure as earth burial 
(unless it be cremation). Even earthquakes 
seldom disturb the buried dead, even 
though the monument is thrown down. 
On the other hand, I am in favor of 
community mausoleums if the pubiic de- 
mands them, but they should be built as 
nearly perfect as possible, well endowed, 
and built by the cemetery authorities with- 
out any connection whatever with any out- 
side company. 
Limited time precluded a discussion 
of this paper, as it did also of the ex- 
cellent paper on “Re-arranging an Old 
Cemetery,’’ by F. H. Rutherford, Ham- 
ilton, Ont. He said in part : 
REORGANIZING AN OLD CEMETERY. 
By E. H. Rutherford. 
In the case of a municipally owned ceme- 
tery, probably the first step taken should 
be to have the management of the grounds 
transferred to an independent board, com- 
posed of citizens who have plenty of leisure 
time, and whose term of office would be - 
long enough to insure a continuity of plans. 
Then follows the framing of rules, and the 
board and superintendent that expect to 
enforce absolutely a perfect set of rules in 
a year or ten years are going to endure 
some moments of bitter disappointment, for 
if it were possible to frame this ideal code 
it would be absolutely impossible to enforce 
it entirely in so short a time. 
Citizens who have come to consider that 
a cemetery consists principally of high 
mounds, fences, vines and surplus bric-a- 
brac and glassware from the home are not 
so easily persuaded that it is time for a 
change, more especially if these citizens 
have arrived at advanced years of intelli- 
gence. 
Make your rules as nearly perfect as is 
possible. Shape your plans all in the one 
direction, and then, assuming that aii lot 
owners are Missourians, proceed to show 
them what might be done. 
If the superintendent is fortunate enough 
to be possessed of full knowledge of his 
work so much the easier, but even if in- 
experienced the task is far from hopeless, 
Some slight benefit will undoubtedly be 
derived from the perusal of the literature 
of other cemeteries, but it would seem to 
us that it is absolutely necessary that these 
cemeteries should be visited, not necessarily 
the magnificent ones, studded with mauso- 
leums, memorial chapels and the like, al- 
though these are educative, but the more 
modest burial grounds not overburdened by 
great wealth, but whose superintendents 
have fought and are fighting successfully 
similar difficulties, and are ready to share 
that knowledge, gained perhaps by bitter 
experience. 
When ready to commence work the lot 
owners should be taken into the superin- 
tendent’s confidence and, until proven guilty 
of animosity to the new rule of things, 
all should be adjudged as friends. 
Tell them your plans and the reasons, 
and then proceed as far as may safely be 
attempted to make them do as you advise. 
As time passes the chronic kickers will 
be discovered, and to these, while acting 
fairly, no special consideration should be 
shown; for if the superintendent is on the 
right track, public opinion will uphold him. 
The new sections, as opened, should con- 
form strictly to the best usages, and so 
should be an example to owners In other 
sections of what might be accompiished. 
But the work should not rest there, for the 
campaign should be carried, as soon as 
possibie, into the older portions; and while 
the degree of power possessed by the board 
will necessarily govern to some extent the 
amount of work to be attempted, yet it 
can be safely asserted from experience that 
if, when complete plans have been made for 
the regrading and improving of a section, 
the lot owners are notified fully of the in- 
tended changes, with the reasons for these, 
the objecting owner will be in such a small 
minority that the superintendent may safely 
ignore his objections. 
This work of improvement should be un- 
dertaken systematically, a certain portion 
to be completed each season, and it should 
be commenced most cautiously, especially 
for the first two or three years when the 
system is on trial, every effort being made 
to show all possible respect for the feelings 
of those accustomed by years of experience 
to the old order of things, resting assured 
that each year’s work will be easier than the 
last. 
The money for this work of improvement 
must be derived from some source, and in 
the absence of any fund for the purpose this 
money might be derived from the sale of 
new ground without resulting in any great 
hardship to the purchasers, especiaiiy in a 
municipally owned cemetery where profits 
are not required, it being stili possible tO' 
provide a fund sufficient for the care with- 
out making the cost of the ground exorbi- 
tant. Certainly the provision for a time of 
this extra money is necessary, from what- 
ever source, and certainly also the likeli- 
hood of there being any funds accumulated 
under the old management is very remote. 
It is hardly necessary to say that the 
commencement of a perpetual care fund 
should be undertaken at the outset, and 
while probably the corresponding increase 
in price of ground wili come as a shock to- 
the unthinking, and while it is possible that 
provision will still have to be made in the 
municipal cemetery for the poorer citizen, 
yet it should be possible to so educate the 
people that in a few years a sum would be 
derived from the sale of every lot to provide' 
for its care (after setting aside the neces- 
sary sinking funds). 
An educative campaign in reference to the 
perpetual care of the older cemetery should 
also be started, and in order to emphasize 
the advantages derived from this care the 
annual charges should be made reasonably 
high. 
Practically every letter or statement leav- 
ing the office should contain an enclosure 
dealing with the advantages of this perpet- 
ual care system, and it will be found that 
soon the citizens, adopting these arguments 
as their very own, will be the superintend- 
ent’s best missionaries to the benighted. 
