PARK AND CEMETERY 
AND LANDSCAPE GARDENING 
PUBLISHED BY ALLIED ARTS PUBLISHING COMPANY 
R. J. HAIGHT, President fi. C. WHITAKER, Viee-President and General Manager O. H. SAMPLE, Secretary-Treasurer 
VOL. XXIII AUGUST, 1913 No. 6 
EDITORIAL 
Park Superintendents at Denver 
The annual convention of the American Association of 
Park Superintendents, to be heid at Denver, August 25, 26 
and 27, promises to be one of the most interesting in the his- 
tory of that live and useful organization. As is noted in the 
program elsewhere in this issue, especial attention is to be 
given to practical field work, and the Denver park system 
offers unusual opportunities for the study of many phases of 
Organization 
The activities of the recently organized Illinois State Park 
Commission call to mind the increasing importance of the 
work of organizing state parks, and the progress that is being 
made along this line in a number of states. The Illinois Park 
Commission was created by an act of the Legislature ap- 
proved June 10, 1911. The sum of $150,000 was appropriated 
at the same session of the Legislature. The commission has 
spent the $150,000 and has acquired for the state the nucleus 
of a park, some 304 acres. The site whose purchase was 
authorized by the bill creating the commission is a strip of 
land containing 1,155 acres lying along the south side of the 
Illinois River and including Starved Rock and various can- 
yons and picturesque bits that go to make this region famous. 
The park site proper, on which is Starved Rock, consisted 
of 280 acres. The Starved Rock park is located between 
Ottawa and La Salle and directly across the river from Utica. 
As soon as the park was taken over by the state the commis- 
sion set about organizing it and improving it. A custodian 
Editorial 
Another request for delay in the accounting ordered by 
Supreme Court Justice Giegerich from the Pinelawn Cem- 
etery Association, in the long-pending shareholders’ proceed- 
ing against the company, was recently made before Percival 
H. Gregory, as referee, at 256 Broadway, Manhattan. William 
H. Locke, Jr., secretary and treasurer of the association, as- 
serts that it has been a physical impossibility to get ready the 
more detailed account ordered last month by Mr. Gregory, in 
the place of the one which gave only general summaries, in 
the time at his disposal. This is the latest phase of a bitterly 
contested suit which has revolved around Pinelawn Cemetery 
for about six years, and which has brought much unenviable 
publicity to former Assemblyman Abram C. Degraw, for 
many years one of the best-known figures of the Greenpoint 
section of Brooklyn. Pinelawn is a cemetery tract of many 
hundreds of acres, about thirty miles out on Long Island, 
and its development was begun more than ten years ago by 
Degraw through the consolidation of eleven cemetery asso- 
ciations. Manv shareholders were attracted to it through 
Mr. De graw and through the promise of enormous profits, 
and its directorate included many well-known persons. But 
in 1905 there came dissension and former United States Sen- 
ator Depew resigned as a director, accompanying his resig- 
nation with a letter in which he attacked the officers of the 
company. This was followed by Mr. Tyndall’s action, his 
suit being begun in 1908. 
Legislation on cemetery matters has been unusually active 
m Pennsylvania recently, as has been noted in these pages. 
The bill to provide for the keeping of cemetery records 
was passed overwhelmingly at a recent session, but was made 
modern park activities. Denver has made rapid strides in 
park development, and offers a most profitable field for this 
three days’ school of experience and demonstration. It is to 
be practical "laboratory” work in actual park affairs, and 
every progressive superintendent or park official who can 
possibly get to this meeting will find it time well spent in 
advanced education and inspiration for his work. 
of State Parks 
was appointed, the grounds were efficiently policed, the sale of 
liquor prohibited under the statute, and disorderly persons were 
prohibited the grounds. Concessions were let upon competitive 
bids and a considerable sum of money was derived from tbeir 
source. The concessions include a hotel and lunch room ; ice 
cream, candies, etc., bowling alley and dance hall ; row boats and 
power boats ; livery and auto bus ; 130 acres of fertile farm land ; 
souvenirs; electric light and power service. The commission re- 
serves the right to supervise all charges made by persons holding 
concessions and to exercise general authority over conduct on the 
grounds. The patronage of the park for 1912 was approximately 
75,000, as against 25,000 under private management. The popularity 
of the park was greatly increased during the season of 1912 
by the establishment there of the camp of the American Film 
Manufacturing Co. This concern had a company of sixty to 
seventy-five people there for the purpose of reproducing the 
history of Starved Rock and particularly that part in which 
La Salle, Tonty, Joliet and Marquette were concerned. 
Notes 
to apply only to Philadelphia as the result of objections 
of Senator Homsher, of Lancaster County, who feared that 
the enactment of the measure as originally drafted would 
cause unnecessary annoyance to the Dunkards and other re- 
ligious organizations in his section of the state, which have 
private or society burial grounds. The preamble of the bill 
sets forth that “owing to loose and inefficient methods of list- 
ing now employed in many burial grounds, it is difficult and 
sometimes impossible to discover the location of certain 
graves.” The bill requires the keeping of a complete list of 
interments under an alphabetical arrangement of names, with 
the date of burial and the number and owner of the lot in 
which the grave is situated. A card index system is to be 
required and the records shall be open to inspection of “all 
persons having an interest therein.” A fine of one hundred 
dollars is provided for violation of the act. Pennsylvania has 
also passed a bill, introduced by Senator Vare, which permits 
the removal of bodies from old cemeteries and the sale of 
the grounds when, because of its location, they are needed 
for other purposes. The measure directly affects cemeteries 
situated on tracts which, although originally on the outskirts 
of Philadelphia, are now surrounded by dwelling and business 
establishments. The bill, which w'as defeated on third read- 
ing by the House recently, was replaced on the calendar by 
Representative Wilson, of Philadelphia, wdio explained that 
many of the members had voted on it under a misapprehen- 
sion. By the provisions of the bill, when a cemetery com- 
pany contemplates removing graves to another plot of 
ground, it must first obtain a decree from the Court of Quar- 
ter Sessions. 
