Perhaps more than any other garden cemetery, SwanPerhaps Point presentsmore than any other garden cemetery, Swan Point presents a comfortable amplitude to any visitor’s experience.a comfortable The land amplitude to any visitor’s experience. The land undulates easily, seemingly spontaneously, and delightfully.undulates easily,The seemingly spontaneously, and delightfully. The variety of specimen trees and shrubbery, both plantedvariety and nativeof specimen trees and shrubbery, both planted and native to the landscape (including a more-than-two-hundred-year-oldto the landscape (including a more-than-two-hundred-year-old Sassafras) makes this a tree-lover’s dream. MonumentsSassafras) enjoy makes this a tree-lover’s dream. Monuments enjoy spacious placement rarely seen in cemeteries of its spaciousage and type.placement The rarely seen in cemeteries of its age and type. The simplicity of most monuments is refreshingly striking,simplicity especially of most in monuments is refreshingly striking, especially in the context of elaborate sculptural compositions typicallythe context found of in elaborate the sculptural compositions typically found in the cemetery’s peers. And the predominance of architecturalcemetery’s monuments peers. And the predominance of architectural monuments

sculptures found here.

From its inception, Swan Point Cemetery has been Froma place its for inception, both Swan Point Cemetery has been a place for both the living and the dead. It is one of those rare placesthe where living both and thehave dead. It is one of those rare places where both have always comfortably inhabited the same space. Remarkablyalways comfortably few of inhabited the same space. Remarkably few of those remain today. This guide is dedicated to you,those the visitor, remain who, today. This guide is dedicated to you, the visitor, who, in the words of founder Thomas Hartshorn, want toin understand the words howof founder Thomas Hartshorn, want to understand how “…its monuments will be local histories teaching the“…its value monuments of life and will be local histories teaching the value of life and the nature of true worth.”

The Tour The Tour processions that pass through these processions that pass through these gates. Here is landscape design gates. Here is landscape design at its most effective in setting at its most effective in setting mood and tone. The simplest of mood and tone. The simplest of elements, large granite boulders elements, large granite boulders so common in the southern New so common in the southern New England soils, are naturalistically England soils, are naturalistically arranged in a composition that arranged in a composition that impressive, yet understated impressive, yet understated and inviting. The bronze dates and inviting. The bronze dates 1. Swan Point Cemetery’s indicate the yearprincipal of the cemetery’s entrance strategically indicate the year of the cemetery’s opening. Visibleoccurs beyond on a the picturesque gates curve of opening. Visible beyond the gates is oak-canopiedBlackstone Holly Avenue, Boulevard as a recessed is oak-canopied Holly Avenue, one of only twocrescendo perfectly in straight the stone wall that one of only two perfectly straight roads in the grounds,forms the leading cemetery’s to its western and roads in the grounds, leading to its heart and focusingnorthern on the borders. emphatic It enhances the heart and focusing on the emphatic verticality of theexperience Barnaby of arrival, especially verticality of the Barnaby monument (4).important for the many funerary monument (4).

1 1 the southwest end 40. The compositionally of the cemetery, striking and commandingly complements the sited Lownes monument style of the existing features a fine bronze sculpture administrative and by Isidore Konti (1862-1938), service buildings. It a Viennese-born artist who contains a chapel studied at that city’s Imperial with seating for Academy. He came to the 100 people, a United States in 1890 to work family room, indoor on decorations at Chicago’s columbarium and World Columbian Exposition mausoleum with an (1893), established a studio array of interior and in New York, and regularly 41. Frank Foster Tingley (1844- exterior crypts. exhibited at the Philadelphia 1921) was a third-generation Academy of Fine Arts; his work member of Providence’s most 2. Immediately inside the gates prominent and long-lived stone- is a random-course granite-ashlar In 2014, the crematory was is in the collection of New York’s renovated and expanded. It houses Metropolitan Museum of Art. carving firm, Tingley Brothers, complex including office, chapel, established in 1811 by Frank’s reception room, mausoleum, a larger committal chapel, and Edgar John Lownes (1870- a viewing room for cremation 1924) was a textile manufacturer grandfather Sylvanus and his crematory, and columbarium. brother Samuel Tingley. Frank The original office-and-chapel committal. Also constructed with strong ties to the design and was a new reception hall that music communities. His wife, trained with, among others, building (1906), designed by architect Alfred Stone (2, 3, 11), Stone, Carpenter & Willson (while has comfortable seating for 80. Therèse Kaffenburg (1877- This room is a popular choice for 1970), presented at court before and the family-firm’s monuments Stone was cemetery President; within the cemetery are numerous, see 3 below) in the manner of late post funeral gatherings. A new Queen Victoria, became an early freestanding columbarium offers advocate for women’s suffrage; an and often signed. The curved Gothic vernacular buildings of the bench Tingley designed for textile English countryside, established a interior and exterior niches to accomplished pianist and soprano, accommodate the rising trend of she married, after Lownes’s manufacturer Lyman Bullock Goff design vocabulary for this complex (1841-1927), probably following appropriate to a rural cemetery. inurnment. death, Dr Eugene A. Noble, the first president of New York’s the early death of his only child, Additions to this building include Lyman Thornton Goff (1868- those by John Hutchins Cady in Both units were designed and Juilliard School of Music. Given constructed under the direction of the Lownes’ interest in cultural 1900), is reminiscent in form of the 1947 (also a cemetery President) monument designed by Richard and Architectural firm Haynes de Haynes de Boer Associates. activity, their selection of a well- known sculptor is not surprising. Morris Hunt for August Belmont Boer Associates in 2002. in Newport’s Island Cemetery, then The Crematory, just repeated for the memorial to Hunt north of the Chapel and built in 1898 on New York’s Fifth Office, was designed by Avenue between 70th and 71st Donald Prout Associates Streets. The highly architectural and completed in 1991. quality of this monument, very much in the tradition established In 2006, Swan Point by Tefft half a century earlier Cemetery opened the (10,18), works especially well Redwood Mausoleum/ here, with vegetation and stone Columbarium/Chapel. wall of the cemetery’s northern The building, located in edge just behind.

2 23 38. The most impressively 4. Located at the eastern landscaped lot in the cemetery terminus of Holly Avenue is that of the Aldrich family. and at what is now the center It rises in modern terraces, of the grounds, this statue- all framed by dry-laid flat-cut topped obelisk marks the granite walls, above Beach burial site of Jerothmul B. Avenue on a hill overlooking Barnaby (1830-1889), a the Seekonk River. The central highly successful dry-goods section is devoted to the merchant, his immediate progenitors of this powerful, family, and descendant influential family. Abby Pierce Barnaby Keeney (1914- (1845-1917) and Nelson W. 1980), Brown University Aldrich (1841-1915), United President (1955-66). Stylish States Senator (1881-1911); elected Romanesque columns girdle overall design. Moreover, the play to fill the seat of Ambrose Burnside 3. Designed by Norman M. Isham, the plinth, and the base and cap of between asymmetry and carefully (34), following the latter’s death); who began his career in Stone’s the smooth obelisk are embellished established axes establish a on the same terrace are three of office, the Alfred Stone Memorial, with Néo-Grec friezes. The statue vigorous, yet always pleasing and their children who died young. Up pays tribute to the architect who at top is a standard allegorical comfortable organization, gentled the hill to the south is the grave of served as a cemetery Director figure of mourning, (compare with by the varied vegetation. Lucy Truman Aldrich (1869-1955), from 1876 until his death, the last that in the Lippitt plot, 8), a female a major collector of Orientalia, twelve as President. Stone (1834- figure holding a wreath. The now housed in the Museum of Art, 39. Appropriately adjacent to the 1908), among the first generation monument’s orientation toward Rhode Island School of Design; Aldrich lot is that of Marsden of professional architects as we the east, facing the pond down the hill to the north is that of J. Perry (1850-1935), Nelson understand them today, and not the entrance, William T. Aldrich (1880-1966), Aldrich’s political and business took a keen interest from what was then one of the best and most overlooked ally. Perry lived in the John in planning and land the western edge of the early twentieth-century East Coast Brown House (1786-88) from use issues. He played grounds, recalls the architects. The terracing of the 1902 until his death, and his tomb, a key role in guiding cemetery’s expansion lot was executed by Forest Hills with the cemetery’s best view of the cemetery’s late and reorientation. Nursery in Cranston during the the Seekonk River, reproduces nineteenth-century early 1970s, and most of the stones full-scale the principal entrance of expansion continuing the were carved by the John Stevens his house. precepts of the original Shop in Newport, the country’s design. His burial site oldest continuing stone- is also included in this cutting shop, responsible guide (11). for the best carving in the country, including the Vietnam Memorial on the Mall in Washington. The consistency, not identicality, of the granite markers, subtlety varied and carefully placed, enhance the power of the

22 3 5. In the Bates family plot 36. Appropriately close 37. One of the most seven very fine Colonial in death as in life, just striking and poignant Revival monuments, around the corner from monuments in the erected in the early years Sarah Doyle’s grave cemetery is the one of the twentieth century, is that of Elizabeth of realtor Samuel A. create an exceptionally Buffum Chace (1806- Nightingale (1828- subtle visual fugue of form, 1899), another long-lived, 1906) erected in the decorative vocabulary, and aggressive, and highly memory of his only color. Isaac Comstock principled woman. Chace, child, Nina (1875) and Bates (1843-1913) was a a Quaker, was the daughter his wife, also named wealthy meat provisioner of abolitionist Arnold Buffum, Nina, who died the following who played significant roles friend and colleague of William year. The larger-than-life-scale in Providence’s burgeoning art 6. One of the cemetery’s most Lloyd Garrison, whose fiery bronze monument of an angel rising community in the late nineteenth compelling plots, the Sprague lot speeches in the 1830s led her heavenward bearing an infant in her and early twentieth centuries, as blends landscape design, funerary and her sister to form the Fall arms set on an oval-plan plinth was a Director of both Rhode Island sculpture, and industrial, political, River Anti-Slavery Society. Her cast by A. Rolland. After his wife’s School of Design (RISD), President and social history into a mutually house in Central Falls, since death, in the year after their daughter, from 1910 until his death, and reinforcing ensemble seldom demolished, was one of Rhode Nightingale left the family home The Providence Art Club, as well paralleled, here or elsewhere. This Island’s few documented stops on Hope Street and boarded at a as a major collector of paintings circular lot at one of the cemetery’s on the underground railroad. Downtown hotel. and etchings, many of which were most eminent promontories (albeit After the Civil War, she occupied bequeathed to RISD. Bates’s now bereft of views downhill herself with temperance, and highly developed taste is probably to the south and east because of women’s voting rights and higher central to understanding this large-scale coniferous vegetation) education. Like Doyle, she was grouping, which includes markers marvelously exploits circular active in securing admission of for his wife, parents, sister and organization to crown the site. women to Brown University. brother-in-law, and nephew and his Holding the center is a marble In the year preceding her death wife. Bates’s own angular, dark- monument based on the Greek she was still active, penning an grey stone, by far the most severe, fourth-century B.C.E. Choragic article in support of women’s becomes the focal point of the Monument of Lysicrates, designed suffrage for The Woman’s group, with other stones playing off by James Bucklin (who used the Journal. blue, tan, and green variations of same source for the lantern atop grey slate and granite, modulations Downtown Providence’s Beneficent of early eighteenth-century Congregational Church, which tombstone shapes, maintains a and the-best-quality plot in the carved decoration, cemetery for distinguishable the burial of by depth and its ministers). elaboration. The Grosvenor family plot (12) presents a grouping similar in quality but visually quite different. 4 21 34. Ambrose Burnside (1824- 35. The modest 6. (Sprague Lot continued) stone of Sarah 1881) entered the English lexicon Family burials extend concentrically Elizabeth Doyle because of the flamboyant whiskers from the center, albeit here with (1830-1922), that extended down his face in none of the calculated egotism similar to those front of his ears. Sideburns, as of the most famous circular of adjacent they became known, have gone American plot, the Sedgwick Pie in family members, in and out of fashion many times Stockbridge, Massachusetts. There, including long-time since his life. Burnside served the interments are arranged such Providence mayor as a Union General in the Civil that on the Day of Resurrection, Thomas A. Doyle War, came home to be elected each family member is to rise facing (1827-1886), doesn’t even begin to Governor, followed by a career inward, and thus seeing only other hint at the significant contributions in the United States Senate. The Sedgwicks. The Spragues, made she made to women’s education ledger stones of Burnside and his rich by cotton manufacturing at the and suffrage. Long-time teacher 7. The Hope Memorial Garden wife, in the plot of her family, the Cranston Print Works, produced two and principal in Providence perhaps best illustrates the Bishops, are simple marble stones, nineteenth-century Rhode Island schools, she was a charter member cemetery’s continuing attention each with short Biblical quotations Governors, both named William, of the corporation of Rhode Island to accommodating burial needs appropriate to each. uncle (1799-1856; Governor School of Design (RISD); the in modern yet visually and 1838-39), buried here, and nephew, leader of the Rhode Island Society emotionally fulfilling settings. buried at (32). The predominance for the Collegiate Education The focal point of the garden is of white marble reinforces the of Women, which sponsored a mixed-medium sculpture, two lot’s presence. By far the most the establishment of Pembroke triangular pink-granite monoliths engaging monument here, however, College at Brown University; as backdrop for an eighteenth- is the sarcophagus with the gisant and an early, ardent supporter of century anchor, a symbol both of figures memorializing the two women’s suffrage. Upon return hope and of the State of Rhode elder children of Byron and Harriet from her only Grand Tour of Island, whose flag and seal it Sprague, Mary (1850-1860) and Europe, at the age of seventy six, graces. The stone sculpture, William Comstock (1857-1860), by she offered the opinion, “I believe designed by Brown University Charles Hemenway, which reminds more than ever in the power of art professor Richard Fishman of the pervasive incidence of infant women to elevate this country if and originally installed at an mortality in the nineteenth-century. they would feel their responsibility outdoor chapel on Providence’s (Compare with the Lippitt plot, 8.) and exert their influence.” Killingly Street in 1972, was Following her death at ninety-two, moved here in October 1976. L. Earle Rowe, Director of RISD Burial plots are arranged recalled her “… in gentle arcs facing the as a leader in the sculpture, an outdoor higher education and non-denominational of women…one of simulacrum of a worship the five or six most space. The variety of prominent women stones here reflects both in the country.” the diversity of Rhode Island’s population and the cemetery’s historically inclusive attitude.

20 5 was the first in the family of a number of important politicians, including his grandson State House of Representatives Minority Leader Frederick Lippitt, great-grandson United States Senator John H. Chafee, and great-great grandson U.S. Senator and Governor Lincoln Chafee. 9. A strong, simple granite 32. The tomb of William Sprague 33. The small granite stone 8. Dramatically sited amid a three- obelisk, emerging from a faceted (1830-1915), the largest in the installed more than thirty years way intersection at South Avenue and base and ornamented only with cemetery and commanding the after his death marks the grave of Ridge Way, the Lippitt triangle was floral and ivy garlands, marks most prominent site, expresses the writer Howard Phillips Lovecraft long the cemetery’s most prominent the burial site of one of the most egotism of this prominent scion (1890-1937). Little known, only and immediately distinguishable important industrialists of the of the largest mid-nineteenth- rarely and obscurely published in plot, highly visible from the original nineteenth century, George H. century textile-manufacturing his lifetime, and yet object of cult- entrance when it was located less Corliss (1817-1888). Corliss family and Civil-War Governor like adoration by fans world wide, than a quarter of a mile to the developed and manufactured of Rhode Island. The large Lovecraft has enjoyed considerable northwest. Dominating the granite- the world’s most powerful and circular-monument form harks scholarly attention in the last coping-walled plot is an elaborate almost universally employed back to tombs used by the ancient twenty years and is undoubtedly and beautifully site-specific plinth steam engines, including those at Etruscans and even more by their Providence’s most important supporting an allegorical mourning the machine-tool company of his Italian-peninsula successors during literary figure. Much of his work figure, similar to that at Barnaby neighbor Joseph R. Brown (13). the Roman Empire. Probably is set locally, and his stories are (4). Henry Lippitt (1816-1881), a Obelisks, a form advocated by the best known of these is the enriched by his use of Providence textile manufacturer, served as Rhode sculptor Horatio Greenough and former mausoleum of Emperor places and buildings. A native and Island Governor from 1875 to 1877. found throughout the cemetery, Hadrian in Rome, on the banks life-long resident, he wrote the Mary Ann Balch Lippitt (1823- became popular in the first half of the Tiber, now known as the words “I AM PROVIDENCE” to 1889), his wife, became an important of the nineteenth century; the Castel Sant’ Angelo. Sprague led a friend in 1927 upon return from advocate for the deaf, following Washington Monument, begun Rhode Island into the Civil War, a brief, unhappy sojourn in New their daughter Jeanie’s (1852-1940) in the 1840s, is the best known. then married beautiful, ambitious York, hence the epitaph. affliction during a bout at the age The form and material of the Kate Chase (1840-1899), of four with scarlet fever. The monument daughter of President disease claimed the lives of her three and the Lincoln’s first-term brothers, memorialized in the low- substance Secretary of the Treasury, relief white-marble monument just of Corliss’s Salmon P. Chase. Gore to the right of the entrance. To the life Vidal parallels the sparkle left of the entrance is the monument forcefully of glamorous Kate and for Robert Lincoln Lippitt (1823- coalesce William Sprague in early 1858), Henry’s brother, whose house into a 1860s Washington to that on Hope Street stands next to his memorial of John and Jacqueline brother’s; seldom does the symmetry laden with Kennedy there exactly a of proximity in life and death occur meaning. century later. so vividly as here. Governor Lippitt

6 19 30. The Rock Pond 11. Discussed above (2 and 3) as was established by architect, planner, and cemetery the late nineteenth Director, Alfred Stone planned century and offered well for the final resting place for a much-desirable his family, on a gentle slope with water feature on a panoramic view of the Seekonk the inland side River. The view was much better of these riverside until recently, since environmental grounds. In the regulations now require the twentieth century it maintenance of volunteer trees at became the venue water’s edge to prevent erosion. for the cemetery’s Stone’s stone is just that, a large most significant stone, embellished only with a collection of bronze ribbon bearing his and his mausoleums, a wife’s names and dates. This sort form rarely seen elsewhere in 31. Timothy McCarthy (1846- of naturalistic monument was just Swan Point but found here in 1911), born the year of the coming into fashion at the end of rare abundance. Private family cemetery’s organization, became 10. Little is known of Edward the nineteenth century, like the mausoleums became fashionable its third Superintendent in 1876 B. Bohuszewicz (ca 1813-1848) wall that presents the public face shortly after the and served until his death. beyond his interest in music, of the cemetery (see 1), and both turn of the twentieth His naturalistic stone to which alludes the low-relief this stone, used individually, and century, no doubt a monument, similar to that carved lyre on the front of the those of the wall no doubt reflect phenomenon related of cemetery President small brownstone sarcophagus Stone’s aesthetic attitudes toward to the privatization of Alfred Stone (11), reveals atop a plinth that marks his grave. the development of a garden almost every activity their shared vision of The monument, designed cemetery. Probably at that time that an aesthetic appropriate by Thomas Tefft (16), not coincidentally, infected the country’s to a garden cemetery at follows a form that refers they parallel upper-income the turn of the twentieth to burial practices found those of cemetery population. century. Their choices in ancient Rome and in Superintendent Timothy are eminently appropriate Renaissance Italy. It is a McCarthy (31), whose reflections of the cemetery’s sculptural parallel to the own contemporary development at the turn of architectural trends of monument is similar. the twentieth century, when the late 1840s, when the Stone’s daughters, the stone wall first began same sources were used unlike many of their era, to circumscribe its public for buildings. became professionals: edges. Ellen (1870-1952) became a physician, while Esther (1872-1950) followed in her father’s footsteps and became one of the state’s first female architects.

18 7 12. The Grosvenor 28. (Dyer lot continued) plot is probably overall Adjacent to the south of them the most visually is the grave of their son George stunning sculptural Rathbone Dyer (1813-1833), ensemble in the whose broken-column monument, cemetery, thanks to the like that of Robert Grosvenor (12), exclusive use of white symbolizes young death. To the marble for an almost- north of the entrance path are the textbook collection monuments for the firstGovernor of nineteenth-and powerful floral symbol Elisha Dyer (1811-1890), son of 29. The impressive granite twentieth-century of love, places it firmly Frances and Elisha, and his wife, sarcophagus for the Sharpe funerary-sculpture in the late nineteenth Ann Frances (1814-1884), both family recalls with great examples, many century. Adjacent are simple, sculptural interpretations specificity Italian Renaissance with highly charged tributes to several of of ground-level ledger stones. Just sources. Boston architect William symbolism. Two their children who died to their north is the grave of their C. Peters, a Sharpe relative, sarcophagi, larger than young. Immediately son George Rathbone (1834-1851), modeled this monument on the the smaller symbolic to the north of Rosa’s born the year after the death of design by Antonio and Bernardo ones by Tefft (10, grave are those of two his namesake, his father’s brother, Rossellino for the tomb (1460-61) 16), recall Roman and children who died buried at the plot’s south end; his in the Chapel of the Cardinal of Italian Renaissance very young, both in marker, an ironic coda Portugal at Florence’s sources. That for the nineteenth-century to that of his uncle at the San Miniato al Monte. William Grosvenor century diminutive- other end of the plot, is The plot includes three (1810-1888) represents monument tradition, a broken vase, toppled generations of the the former, but here Amasa Mason, who on its side, yet another Sharpes, beginning with overlaid with nineteenth-century died at age three months in nineteenth-century the parents of Brown & symbolism, a cross atop it swathed in 1842, and Eliza Howe (1848- symbol of early death. Sharpe precision-tool- ivy (symbolic of eternity). 1853), whose small slab is At rear is the trefoil- company-founder Lucien crowned by a dove. West of cusped cross of the Sharpe (1830-1899) and Adjacent is that of his wife, Rosa Ann the parents is the grave of second Governor Elisha including his wife and (1817-1872), no doubt prescribed Robert Grosvenor (1848- Dyer (1839-1906), son several of his children. by her husband, who survived her; 1879), marked by a broken of the first Governor His son Henry Dexter created by column, symbol Dyer, historically one of Sharpe (1872-1954) Casoni & of a life cut remarkably few cruciform-shaped carried on the family business. Isola of short, engirdled monuments in the cemetery. Henry’s wife, Mary Elizabeth New York, with eternal Sharpe (1884-1985), played an it is more ivy. Other important role locally in landscape Italian monuments in architecture, including creation Renaissance this family’s plot of the grounds (still beautifully in form, but are variations on extant) of the family house at 84 its urned these themes. Prospect Street, consultation with top filled Brown University on its grounds, with the ivy and establishment of the Sharpe and roses, Tree Fund, which continues to the most fund and oversee the planting of street trees across the city. 8 17 27. Emerging below the 13. Nineteenth-century funerary- hill that crests at the top sculpture designers often looked of Cedar Avenue and to historic burial references, and commanding a fine view no culture was more associated of the Seekonk River is the with burial practices than ancient Egyptian Revival tomb for Egypt. The pyramid is perhaps the Dyer family. Designed the best world-wide known by Russell Warren and symbol of burial practices, and originally installed in what better symbol for one of the 1839 at the Beneficent emperors of industry, Joseph R. Congregational Society Brown (1810-1876), than that of Burial Ground, it came an immortal pharaoh? Brown was 14. Colonel John Stanton Slocum here in 1863. The broad, a founder and the creative genius (1824-1861) was a dedicated geometric forms, rendered of the country’s most important soldier whose career began when in brownstone, very much recall 28. Two related Rhode Island precision-tool company, Brown & he obtained a commission as First the Egyptian Revival gate that had governors (confusingly, like the Sharpe (for the Sharpes, see 29), Lieutenant in the United States just been placed at the entrance Governors Sprague, with the same without which mass production Army from President James Knox to Cambridge’s Mount Auburn name) lie in the Dyer lot, which of identical products would have Polk in February 1847, during Cemetery when this was first resembles Grosvenor, though not been inconceivable. His only the Mexican-American War. constructed. quite so exclusively, (12) in its daughter, Lyra (1845-1907), Governor William Sprague (32) use of white marble. But what married architect Edward Irving gave Slocum the colonelcy of the captivates here is the hierarchy of Nickerson (1845-1908), and their Second Rhode Island Regiment family relationships, the uses of adjacent Colonial Revival stone in the spring of 1861. Slocum symbolism, and its reverberation is a peer with those found in the led the regiment in the Battle of across generations. Visually first Bates plot (5). Their only child, Bull Run, in northern Virginia, and foremost here are the ledger- the sophisticated, world-traveling where he fell on 21 July 1861. His on-column markers for progenitors Lyra Brown Nickerson (1885- finely carved granite monument Frances (1782-1873) and Elisha 1916), inherited the family fortune, is highly personal. Based on the (1772-1854) Dyer, immediately which, after her early sudden death ancient sarcophagus form, it is south of the entrance path to the from typhoid, splendidly endowed embellished with the names of raised plot. both the Providence Public Library battles in which he participated, and the Rhode Island School of Contreras and Chepultepec in Design. the Mexican War as well as the fatal Bull Run, and capped with military accoutrements, sword, epaulets, cape, cap. The finely detailed carving in granite, carried out by Westerly’s Smith Granite Co., one of the nation’s best and most prolific firms, was not possible before nineteenth-century industrialization, when power drills made possible the subtle manipulation of hard stone, like this granite. 16 9 14. (Colonel Slocum 16. Thomas 26. A small, simple continued) Alexander marble stone, similar Tefft (1826- to those of adjacent Slocum’s burial 1859) was an family members, marks here, far from the extraordinarily the grave of Thomas site of his death, gifted archi- Wilson Dorr (1805- reminds that the tect, educated 1854). Scion of a rich Civil War, when so at Brown China-Trade and textile many men perished University manufacturing family, on what was then (Class of Dorr took up the liberal foreign soil because 1851) and cause of extended of the secession trained in the suffrage and, in an of the southern states, was the office of Tallman & Bucklin. Tefft alternative election, event that changed American was the architect most closely became “People’s burial practices. Embalming associated with the cemetery’s 25. Just north of Pastor’s Rest Governor” in 1842, an event became a standard procedure, early years, and his work in both are four very fine stones, marking which prompted an open rebellion, necessary then to enable the architecture and sculpture (10, 18, the grave sites of artist Sydney known as the Dorr War, between sanitary transport of hundreds 19) consummately complemented Burleigh (1853-1931); his wife, the suffrage movement and the of thousands back to their native the cemetery’s landscape Sarah Drew Burleigh (1851- regularly elected governor. Dorr land. development in its earliest years. 1952); and his parents, Ruth was captured, convicted of treason, Burgess Burleigh (1820-1909) 15. Thomas Coles Hartshorn After his sudden death in Italy, his and sentenced to life in prison in body was returned home for burial and George Shepard Burleigh 1844. Dorr’s efforts brought about (1800-1854), the founder of (1821-1903). Simple Colonial/ Swan Point Cemetery, left in the plot of his mentor, James the adoption of the state’s first Bucklin (1801-1890). Bucklin’s Federal-era-inspired stones in constitution, effective in 1843 and remarkably little trace of his life varying hues of grey and green and work beyond the legacy of early masterpiece is Downtown replacing the royal Charter of 1663, Providence’s Arcade; his firm slate (the dash of color that stripes which extended male suffrage. this cemetery. His early career across Burleigh’s own stone has was as a preceptor at a private designed the cemetery’s original Dorr, broken in body and spirit, entrance complex (keeper’s house, an artistic flair appropriate to an was released from prison in 1845. school once located in what is individual so dashing in life) are today’s Downtown. By the early barn, fence, and gate), and he remained active professionally distinguished by exceptionally fine 1850s, and until his death, he carving. was a clerk here at the cemetery. well into the 1870s. The design In a poem titled of Tefft’s small brownstone “Time,” Hartshorn sarcophagus is similar to prophetically many designs found in wrote three the extensive collection of years before his architectural drawings he death, “Even left behind. The marker they who led the for Bucklin, his wife, Lucy van[guard]/… Daley Bucklin (1814-1889), have missed the and daughter, Loraine P. fame which they Bucklin (1836-1917) seems contended for,/ rather unremarkable, a thick Obscured and granite slab, but it suggests buried in the an intentional artistic lapse of years….” direction. 10 15 24. The modest 18. The Briggs and Vose flush-mounted monuments offer a fortuitous marker for Alice juxtaposition of two trends in Winsor Hunt nineteenth-century funerary (1872-1968), at monuments, architectural and the edge of the sculptural. Thomas Tefft’s marble Hunt family plot monument for John (1811-1847) and bearing only and Carolyn (ca 1811-1850) her initials and Vose is highly architectural; dates, belies her its juxtaposition of forms not importance as a specifically evocative of historic leader for social burial practices (compare 10, 13, change but very 16) lends an aspect of abstraction much reflects the previously not much seen in grave attitude of one markers but seems somehow to whose obituary have inspired the overall tone of was headlined, monuments in the cemetery. 23. Located deep in the heart of “She Lived for Others.” A The monument for William O. (ca the Unitarian Grounds is the burial graduate of Classical High School 1805-1887) and Emily L. Briggs place of two of the state’s, if not and Wellesley College (in an era (ca 1817-1898), on the other the region’s, most significant when very few women enjoyed 17. Naturalistic landscape features hand, is charged with meaning individuals. Jesse Metcalf (1827- higher education), she devoted her have been an important component and sentiment: an angel carries 1899), founder of the Wanskuck life, after ten years of teaching, of the cemetery’s design since heavenward the soul though still Mills, was one of the state’s leading to reform. Her pet project was its inception. The Forty Steps, embodied in earthly form), a industrialists. Helen Adelia children’s welfare, and the results rising southwest from powerful Rowe Metcalf (1830-1895), his of her efforts brought about child- Forest Avenue up response wife, founded the Rhode Island labor laws and the state juvenile- the hill capped by toward the School of Design; much praised court system. Ridge Way, undulates transcendence as a benefactor of the poor, she across its rise, framed of the human extended generosity even immediately by laurel spirit. Of to striking workers of her and rhododendron, the relatively husband’s company. Their a superb understory small number descendants included a United planting for the tall of figural States Senator, individuals oaks and maples sculptures in who saw the growth of RISD in the background. the cemetery, as an educational and cultural The appeal of this this is one landmark, and publishers of landscape feature is of the most the Providence Journal. The only enhanced by vivid. sarcophagus that marks their burial understanding the site is less generic than Tefft’s unobtrusiveness of designs (10, 16) and resembles its highly calculated more specific sources like fifteenth- design. century Italian prototypes, similar to that of the Sharpes (29).

14 11 22. The First Unitarian Society Grounds occupies a large, five-acre ellipse whose principal axis runs northwest to southeast. The picturesquely irregular paths within are loosely concentric, breaking from even casual regularity at the north and south ends. The Unitarians’ previous 21. The W. Tibbets Pearce plot burial ground in the West Burial holds interest for at least two Ground, near the intersection reasons: its enclosure and its of Interstate Highways 95 and monument. Many of the earliest 195, was vacated beginning in family plots in Swan Point were 1848, when the remains and their enclosed by low fencing, like the stones were moved here. While low brownstone balustrade seen remains from other portions of 19. Emerging from a hillock 20. Just above the receiving tomb here. Weathering and deterioration the West Burial Ground were also above Cedar Avenue, the original is the brownstone sarcophagus of over the years claimed many, and removed to Swan Point, nowhere receiving tomb, designed by John Rogers Vinton (1827- today’s more efficient, mechanized else in the cemetery are fine, Thomas Tefft (16) shows the 1848), a fatality of the Mexican means of groundskeeping preclude Federal-era slate markers found round-arch, Lombard Romanesque American War’s Battle of Vera their use. This charming example, in such abundance. Just north of style that Tefft favored and used Cruz. The cannonball that felled dated 1849, remains a good Monument Avenue is Pastor’s for the original building at Butler him rests atop the monument, touchstone to earlier practices. Rest, the burial site of ministers Hospital, immediately south of and bollards shaped like cannon Captain Pearce (1807-1863) was at the First Unitarian Church. A the cemetery, and in his landmark barrels surround the sarcophagus. a mariner, as attests the low-relief large circular monument marks Union Station complex (1848), Siting, historic burial reference, ship carved on the marble plinth at the middle of a slight rise, around formerly in the middle of today’s and life-and-death-specific imagery the lot’s center. which are ringed the burial sites. Kennedy Plaza in Downtown combine in one of the cemetery’s Providence. Receiving tombs most gripping ensembles. were far more often used in the nineteenth century, before the development of powered earth- moving tools that now make possible the year- round preparation of burial plots.

12 13 22. The First Unitarian Society Grounds occupies a large, five-acre ellipse whose principal axis runs northwest to southeast. The picturesquely irregular paths within are loosely concentric, breaking from even casual regularity at the north and south ends. The Unitarians’ previous 21. The W. Tibbets Pearce plot burial ground in the West Burial holds interest for at least two Ground, near the intersection reasons: its enclosure and its of Interstate Highways 95 and monument. Many of the earliest 195, was vacated beginning in family plots in Swan Point were 1848, when the remains and their enclosed by low fencing, like the stones were moved here. While low brownstone balustrade seen remains from other portions of 19. Emerging from a hillock 20. Just above the receiving tomb here. Weathering and deterioration the West Burial Ground were also above Cedar Avenue, the original is the brownstone sarcophagus of over the years claimed many, and removed to Swan Point, nowhere receiving tomb, designed by John Rogers Vinton (1827- today’s more efficient, mechanized else in the cemetery are fine, Thomas Tefft (16) shows the 1848), a fatality of the Mexican means of groundskeeping preclude Federal-era slate markers found round-arch, Lombard Romanesque American War’s Battle of Vera their use. This charming example, in such abundance. Just north of style that Tefft favored and used Cruz. The cannonball that felled dated 1849, remains a good Monument Avenue is Pastor’s for the original building at Butler him rests atop the monument, touchstone to earlier practices. Rest, the burial site of ministers Hospital, immediately south of and bollards shaped like cannon Captain Pearce (1807-1863) was at the First Unitarian Church. A the cemetery, and in his landmark barrels surround the sarcophagus. a mariner, as attests the low-relief large circular monument marks Union Station complex (1848), Siting, historic burial reference, ship carved on the marble plinth at the middle of a slight rise, around formerly in the middle of today’s and life-and-death-specific imagery the lot’s center. which are ringed the burial sites. Kennedy Plaza in Downtown combine in one of the cemetery’s Providence. Receiving tombs most gripping ensembles. were far more often used in the nineteenth century, before the development of powered earth- moving tools that now make possible the year- round preparation of burial plots.

12 13 24. The modest 18. The Briggs and Vose flush-mounted monuments offer a fortuitous marker for Alice juxtaposition of two trends in Winsor Hunt nineteenth-century funerary (1872-1968), at monuments, architectural and the edge of the sculptural. Thomas Tefft’s marble Hunt family plot monument for John (1811-1847) and bearing only and Carolyn (ca 1811-1850) her initials and Vose is highly architectural; dates, belies her its juxtaposition of forms not importance as a specifically evocative of historic leader for social burial practices (compare 10, 13, change but very 16) lends an aspect of abstraction much reflects the previously not much seen in grave attitude of one markers but seems somehow to whose obituary have inspired the overall tone of was headlined, monuments in the cemetery. 23. Located deep in the heart of “She Lived for Others.” A The monument for William O. (ca the Unitarian Grounds is the burial graduate of Classical High School 1805-1887) and Emily L. Briggs place of two of the state’s, if not and Wellesley College (in an era (ca 1817-1898), on the other the region’s, most significant when very few women enjoyed 17. Naturalistic landscape features hand, is charged with meaning individuals. Jesse Metcalf (1827- higher education), she devoted her have been an important component and sentiment: an angel carries 1899), founder of the Wanskuck life, after ten years of teaching, of the cemetery’s design since heavenward the soul though still Mills, was one of the state’s leading to reform. Her pet project was its inception. The Forty Steps, embodied in earthly form), a industrialists. Helen Adelia children’s welfare, and the results rising southwest from powerful Rowe Metcalf (1830-1895), his of her efforts brought about child- Forest Avenue up response wife, founded the Rhode Island labor laws and the state juvenile- the hill capped by toward the School of Design; much praised court system. Ridge Way, undulates transcendence as a benefactor of the poor, she across its rise, framed of the human extended generosity even immediately by laurel spirit. Of to striking workers of her and rhododendron, the relatively husband’s company. Their a superb understory small number descendants included a United planting for the tall of figural States Senator, individuals oaks and maples sculptures in who saw the growth of RISD in the background. the cemetery, as an educational and cultural The appeal of this this is one landmark, and publishers of landscape feature is of the most the Providence Journal. The only enhanced by vivid. sarcophagus that marks their burial understanding the site is less generic than Tefft’s unobtrusiveness of designs (10, 16) and resembles its highly calculated more specific sources like fifteenth- design. century Italian prototypes, similar to that of the Sharpes (29).

14 11 14. (Colonel Slocum 16. Thomas 26. A small, simple continued) Alexander marble stone, similar Tefft (1826- to those of adjacent Slocum’s burial 1859) was an family members, marks here, far from the extraordinarily the grave of Thomas site of his death, gifted archi- Wilson Dorr (1805- reminds that the tect, educated 1854). Scion of a rich Civil War, when so at Brown China-Trade and textile many men perished University manufacturing family, on what was then (Class of Dorr took up the liberal foreign soil because 1851) and cause of extended of the secession trained in the suffrage and, in an of the southern states, was the office of Tallman & Bucklin. Tefft alternative election, event that changed American was the architect most closely became “People’s burial practices. Embalming associated with the cemetery’s 25. Just north of Pastor’s Rest Governor” in 1842, an event became a standard procedure, early years, and his work in both are four very fine stones, marking which prompted an open rebellion, necessary then to enable the architecture and sculpture (10, 18, the grave sites of artist Sydney known as the Dorr War, between sanitary transport of hundreds 19) consummately complemented Burleigh (1853-1931); his wife, the suffrage movement and the of thousands back to their native the cemetery’s landscape Sarah Drew Burleigh (1851- regularly elected governor. Dorr land. development in its earliest years. 1952); and his parents, Ruth was captured, convicted of treason, Burgess Burleigh (1820-1909) 15. Thomas Coles Hartshorn After his sudden death in Italy, his and sentenced to life in prison in body was returned home for burial and George Shepard Burleigh 1844. Dorr’s efforts brought about (1800-1854), the founder of (1821-1903). Simple Colonial/ Swan Point Cemetery, left in the plot of his mentor, James the adoption of the state’s first Bucklin (1801-1890). Bucklin’s Federal-era-inspired stones in constitution, effective in 1843 and remarkably little trace of his life varying hues of grey and green and work beyond the legacy of early masterpiece is Downtown replacing the royal Charter of 1663, Providence’s Arcade; his firm slate (the dash of color that stripes which extended male suffrage. this cemetery. His early career across Burleigh’s own stone has was as a preceptor at a private designed the cemetery’s original Dorr, broken in body and spirit, entrance complex (keeper’s house, an artistic flair appropriate to an was released from prison in 1845. school once located in what is individual so dashing in life) are today’s Downtown. By the early barn, fence, and gate), and he remained active professionally distinguished by exceptionally fine 1850s, and until his death, he carving. was a clerk here at the cemetery. well into the 1870s. The design In a poem titled of Tefft’s small brownstone “Time,” Hartshorn sarcophagus is similar to prophetically many designs found in wrote three the extensive collection of years before his architectural drawings he death, “Even left behind. The marker they who led the for Bucklin, his wife, Lucy van[guard]/… Daley Bucklin (1814-1889), have missed the and daughter, Loraine P. fame which they Bucklin (1836-1917) seems contended for,/ rather unremarkable, a thick Obscured and granite slab, but it suggests buried in the an intentional artistic lapse of years….” direction. 10 15 27. Emerging below the 13. Nineteenth-century funerary- hill that crests at the top sculpture designers often looked of Cedar Avenue and to historic burial references, and commanding a fine view no culture was more associated of the Seekonk River is the with burial practices than ancient Egyptian Revival tomb for Egypt. The pyramid is perhaps the Dyer family. Designed the best world-wide known by Russell Warren and symbol of burial practices, and originally installed in what better symbol for one of the 1839 at the Beneficent emperors of industry, Joseph R. Congregational Society Brown (1810-1876), than that of Burial Ground, it came an immortal pharaoh? Brown was 14. Colonel John Stanton Slocum here in 1863. The broad, a founder and the creative genius (1824-1861) was a dedicated geometric forms, rendered of the country’s most important soldier whose career began when in brownstone, very much recall 28. Two related Rhode Island precision-tool company, Brown & he obtained a commission as First the Egyptian Revival gate that had governors (confusingly, like the Sharpe (for the Sharpes, see 29), Lieutenant in the United States just been placed at the entrance Governors Sprague, with the same without which mass production Army from President James Knox to Cambridge’s Mount Auburn name) lie in the Dyer lot, which of identical products would have Polk in February 1847, during Cemetery when this was first resembles Grosvenor, though not been inconceivable. His only the Mexican-American War. constructed. quite so exclusively, (12) in its daughter, Lyra (1845-1907), Governor William Sprague (32) use of white marble. But what married architect Edward Irving gave Slocum the colonelcy of the captivates here is the hierarchy of Nickerson (1845-1908), and their Second Rhode Island Regiment family relationships, the uses of adjacent Colonial Revival stone in the spring of 1861. Slocum symbolism, and its reverberation is a peer with those found in the led the regiment in the Battle of across generations. Visually first Bates plot (5). Their only child, Bull Run, in northern Virginia, and foremost here are the ledger- the sophisticated, world-traveling where he fell on 21 July 1861. His on-column markers for progenitors Lyra Brown Nickerson (1885- finely carved granite monument Frances (1782-1873) and Elisha 1916), inherited the family fortune, is highly personal. Based on the (1772-1854) Dyer, immediately which, after her early sudden death ancient sarcophagus form, it is south of the entrance path to the from typhoid, splendidly endowed embellished with the names of raised plot. both the Providence Public Library battles in which he participated, and the Rhode Island School of Contreras and Chepultepec in Design. the Mexican War as well as the fatal Bull Run, and capped with military accoutrements, sword, epaulets, cape, cap. The finely detailed carving in granite, carried out by Westerly’s Smith Granite Co., one of the nation’s best and most prolific firms, was not possible before nineteenth-century industrialization, when power drills made possible the subtle manipulation of hard stone, like this granite. 16 9 12. The Grosvenor 28. (Dyer lot continued) plot is probably overall Adjacent to the south of them the most visually is the grave of their son George stunning sculptural Rathbone Dyer (1813-1833), ensemble in the whose broken-column monument, cemetery, thanks to the like that of Robert Grosvenor (12), exclusive use of white symbolizes young death. To the marble for an almost- north of the entrance path are the textbook collection monuments for the firstGovernor of nineteenth-and powerful floral symbol Elisha Dyer (1811-1890), son of 29. The impressive granite twentieth-century of love, places it firmly Frances and Elisha, and his wife, sarcophagus for the Sharpe funerary-sculpture in the late nineteenth Ann Frances (1814-1884), both family recalls with great examples, many century. Adjacent are simple, sculptural interpretations specificity Italian Renaissance with highly charged tributes to several of of ground-level ledger stones. Just sources. Boston architect William symbolism. Two their children who died to their north is the grave of their C. Peters, a Sharpe relative, sarcophagi, larger than young. Immediately son George Rathbone (1834-1851), modeled this monument on the the smaller symbolic to the north of Rosa’s born the year after the death of design by Antonio and Bernardo ones by Tefft (10, grave are those of two his namesake, his father’s brother, Rossellino for the tomb (1460-61) 16), recall Roman and children who died buried at the plot’s south end; his in the Chapel of the Cardinal of Italian Renaissance very young, both in marker, an ironic coda Portugal at Florence’s sources. That for the nineteenth-century to that of his uncle at the San Miniato al Monte. William Grosvenor century diminutive- other end of the plot, is The plot includes three (1810-1888) represents monument tradition, a broken vase, toppled generations of the the former, but here Amasa Mason, who on its side, yet another Sharpes, beginning with overlaid with nineteenth-century died at age three months in nineteenth-century the parents of Brown & symbolism, a cross atop it swathed in 1842, and Eliza Howe (1848- symbol of early death. Sharpe precision-tool- ivy (symbolic of eternity). 1853), whose small slab is At rear is the trefoil- company-founder Lucien crowned by a dove. West of cusped cross of the Sharpe (1830-1899) and Adjacent is that of his wife, Rosa Ann the parents is the grave of second Governor Elisha including his wife and (1817-1872), no doubt prescribed Robert Grosvenor (1848- Dyer (1839-1906), son several of his children. by her husband, who survived her; 1879), marked by a broken of the first Governor His son Henry Dexter created by column, symbol Dyer, historically one of Sharpe (1872-1954) Casoni & of a life cut remarkably few cruciform-shaped carried on the family business. Isola of short, engirdled monuments in the cemetery. Henry’s wife, Mary Elizabeth New York, with eternal Sharpe (1884-1985), played an it is more ivy. Other important role locally in landscape Italian monuments in architecture, including creation Renaissance this family’s plot of the grounds (still beautifully in form, but are variations on extant) of the family house at 84 its urned these themes. Prospect Street, consultation with top filled Brown University on its grounds, with the ivy and establishment of the Sharpe and roses, Tree Fund, which continues to the most fund and oversee the planting of street trees across the city. 8 17 30. The Rock Pond 11. Discussed above (2 and 3) as was established by architect, planner, and cemetery the late nineteenth Director, Alfred Stone planned century and offered well for the final resting place for a much-desirable his family, on a gentle slope with water feature on a panoramic view of the Seekonk the inland side River. The view was much better of these riverside until recently, since environmental grounds. In the regulations now require the twentieth century it maintenance of volunteer trees at became the venue water’s edge to prevent erosion. for the cemetery’s Stone’s stone is just that, a large most significant stone, embellished only with a collection of bronze ribbon bearing his and his mausoleums, a wife’s names and dates. This sort form rarely seen elsewhere in 31. Timothy McCarthy (1846- of naturalistic monument was just Swan Point but found here in 1911), born the year of the coming into fashion at the end of rare abundance. Private family cemetery’s organization, became 10. Little is known of Edward the nineteenth century, like the mausoleums became fashionable its third Superintendent in 1876 B. Bohuszewicz (ca 1813-1848) wall that presents the public face shortly after the and served until his death. beyond his interest in music, of the cemetery (see 1), and both turn of the twentieth His naturalistic stone to which alludes the low-relief this stone, used individually, and century, no doubt a monument, similar to that carved lyre on the front of the those of the wall no doubt reflect phenomenon related of cemetery President small brownstone sarcophagus Stone’s aesthetic attitudes toward to the privatization of Alfred Stone (11), reveals atop a plinth that marks his grave. the development of a garden almost every activity their shared vision of The monument, designed cemetery. Probably at that time that an aesthetic appropriate by Thomas Tefft (16), not coincidentally, infected the country’s to a garden cemetery at follows a form that refers they parallel upper-income the turn of the twentieth to burial practices found those of cemetery population. century. Their choices in ancient Rome and in Superintendent Timothy are eminently appropriate Renaissance Italy. It is a McCarthy (31), whose reflections of the cemetery’s sculptural parallel to the own contemporary development at the turn of architectural trends of monument is similar. the twentieth century, when the late 1840s, when the Stone’s daughters, the stone wall first began same sources were used unlike many of their era, to circumscribe its public for buildings. became professionals: edges. Ellen (1870-1952) became a physician, while Esther (1872-1950) followed in her father’s footsteps and became one of the state’s first female architects.

18 7 was the first in the family of a number of important politicians, including his grandson State House of Representatives Minority Leader Frederick Lippitt, great-grandson United States Senator John H. Chafee, and great-great grandson U.S. Senator and Governor Lincoln Chafee. 9. A strong, simple granite 32. The tomb of William Sprague 33. The small granite stone 8. Dramatically sited amid a three- obelisk, emerging from a faceted (1830-1915), the largest in the installed more than thirty years way intersection at South Avenue and base and ornamented only with cemetery and commanding the after his death marks the grave of Ridge Way, the Lippitt triangle was floral and ivy garlands, marks most prominent site, expresses the writer Howard Phillips Lovecraft long the cemetery’s most prominent the burial site of one of the most egotism of this prominent scion (1890-1937). Little known, only and immediately distinguishable important industrialists of the of the largest mid-nineteenth- rarely and obscurely published in plot, highly visible from the original nineteenth century, George H. century textile-manufacturing his lifetime, and yet object of cult- entrance when it was located less Corliss (1817-1888). Corliss family and Civil-War Governor like adoration by fans world wide, than a quarter of a mile to the developed and manufactured of Rhode Island. The large Lovecraft has enjoyed considerable northwest. Dominating the granite- the world’s most powerful and circular-monument form harks scholarly attention in the last coping-walled plot is an elaborate almost universally employed back to tombs used by the ancient twenty years and is undoubtedly and beautifully site-specific plinth steam engines, including those at Etruscans and even more by their Providence’s most important supporting an allegorical mourning the machine-tool company of his Italian-peninsula successors during literary figure. Much of his work figure, similar to that at Barnaby neighbor Joseph R. Brown (13). the Roman Empire. Probably is set locally, and his stories are (4). Henry Lippitt (1816-1881), a Obelisks, a form advocated by the best known of these is the enriched by his use of Providence textile manufacturer, served as Rhode sculptor Horatio Greenough and former mausoleum of Emperor places and buildings. A native and Island Governor from 1875 to 1877. found throughout the cemetery, Hadrian in Rome, on the banks life-long resident, he wrote the Mary Ann Balch Lippitt (1823- became popular in the first half of the Tiber, now known as the words “I AM PROVIDENCE” to 1889), his wife, became an important of the nineteenth century; the Castel Sant’ Angelo. Sprague led a friend in 1927 upon return from advocate for the deaf, following Washington Monument, begun Rhode Island into the Civil War, a brief, unhappy sojourn in New their daughter Jeanie’s (1852-1940) in the 1840s, is the best known. then married beautiful, ambitious York, hence the epitaph. affliction during a bout at the age The form and material of the Kate Chase (1840-1899), of four with scarlet fever. The monument daughter of President disease claimed the lives of her three and the Lincoln’s first-term brothers, memorialized in the low- substance Secretary of the Treasury, relief white-marble monument just of Corliss’s Salmon P. Chase. Gore to the right of the entrance. To the life Vidal parallels the sparkle left of the entrance is the monument forcefully of glamorous Kate and for Robert Lincoln Lippitt (1823- coalesce William Sprague in early 1858), Henry’s brother, whose house into a 1860s Washington to that on Hope Street stands next to his memorial of John and Jacqueline brother’s; seldom does the symmetry laden with Kennedy there exactly a of proximity in life and death occur meaning. century later. so vividly as here. Governor Lippitt

6 19 34. Ambrose Burnside (1824- 35. The modest 6. (Sprague Lot continued) stone of Sarah 1881) entered the English lexicon Family burials extend concentrically Elizabeth Doyle because of the flamboyant whiskers from the center, albeit here with (1830-1922), that extended down his face in none of the calculated egotism similar to those front of his ears. Sideburns, as of the most famous circular of adjacent they became known, have gone American plot, the Sedgwick Pie in family members, in and out of fashion many times Stockbridge, Massachusetts. There, including long-time since his life. Burnside served the interments are arranged such Providence mayor as a Union General in the Civil that on the Day of Resurrection, Thomas A. Doyle War, came home to be elected each family member is to rise facing (1827-1886), doesn’t even begin to Governor, followed by a career inward, and thus seeing only other hint at the significant contributions in the United States Senate. The Sedgwicks. The Spragues, made she made to women’s education ledger stones of Burnside and his rich by cotton manufacturing at the and suffrage. Long-time teacher 7. The Hope Memorial Garden wife, in the plot of her family, the Cranston Print Works, produced two and principal in Providence perhaps best illustrates the Bishops, are simple marble stones, nineteenth-century Rhode Island schools, she was a charter member cemetery’s continuing attention each with short Biblical quotations Governors, both named William, of the corporation of Rhode Island to accommodating burial needs appropriate to each. uncle (1799-1856; Governor School of Design (RISD); the in modern yet visually and 1838-39), buried here, and nephew, leader of the Rhode Island Society emotionally fulfilling settings. buried at (32). The predominance for the Collegiate Education The focal point of the garden is of white marble reinforces the of Women, which sponsored a mixed-medium sculpture, two lot’s presence. By far the most the establishment of Pembroke triangular pink-granite monoliths engaging monument here, however, College at Brown University; as backdrop for an eighteenth- is the sarcophagus with the gisant and an early, ardent supporter of century anchor, a symbol both of figures memorializing the two women’s suffrage. Upon return hope and of the State of Rhode elder children of Byron and Harriet from her only Grand Tour of Island, whose flag and seal it Sprague, Mary (1850-1860) and Europe, at the age of seventy six, graces. The stone sculpture, William Comstock (1857-1860), by she offered the opinion, “I believe designed by Brown University Charles Hemenway, which reminds more than ever in the power of art professor Richard Fishman of the pervasive incidence of infant women to elevate this country if and originally installed at an mortality in the nineteenth-century. they would feel their responsibility outdoor chapel on Providence’s (Compare with the Lippitt plot, 8.) and exert their influence.” Killingly Street in 1972, was Following her death at ninety-two, moved here in October 1976. L. Earle Rowe, Director of RISD Burial plots are arranged recalled her “… in gentle arcs facing the as a leader in the sculpture, an outdoor higher education and non-denominational of women…one of simulacrum of a worship the five or six most space. The variety of prominent women stones here reflects both in the country.” the diversity of Rhode Island’s population and the cemetery’s historically inclusive attitude.

20 5 5. In the Bates family plot 36. Appropriately close 37. One of the most seven very fine Colonial in death as in life, just striking and poignant Revival monuments, around the corner from monuments in the erected in the early years Sarah Doyle’s grave cemetery is the one of the twentieth century, is that of Elizabeth of realtor Samuel A. create an exceptionally Buffum Chace (1806- Nightingale (1828- subtle visual fugue of form, 1899), another long-lived, 1906) erected in the decorative vocabulary, and aggressive, and highly memory of his only color. Isaac Comstock principled woman. Chace, child, Nina (1875) and Bates (1843-1913) was a a Quaker, was the daughter his wife, also named wealthy meat provisioner of abolitionist Arnold Buffum, Nina, who died the following who played significant roles friend and colleague of William year. The larger-than-life-scale in Providence’s burgeoning art 6. One of the cemetery’s most Lloyd Garrison, whose fiery bronze monument of an angel rising community in the late nineteenth compelling plots, the Sprague lot speeches in the 1830s led her heavenward bearing an infant in her and early twentieth centuries, as blends landscape design, funerary and her sister to form the Fall arms set on an oval-plan plinth was a Director of both Rhode Island sculpture, and industrial, political, River Anti-Slavery Society. Her cast by A. Rolland. After his wife’s School of Design (RISD), President and social history into a mutually house in Central Falls, since death, in the year after their daughter, from 1910 until his death, and reinforcing ensemble seldom demolished, was one of Rhode Nightingale left the family home The Providence Art Club, as well paralleled, here or elsewhere. This Island’s few documented stops on Hope Street and boarded at a as a major collector of paintings circular lot at one of the cemetery’s on the underground railroad. Downtown hotel. and etchings, many of which were most eminent promontories (albeit After the Civil War, she occupied bequeathed to RISD. Bates’s now bereft of views downhill herself with temperance, and highly developed taste is probably to the south and east because of women’s voting rights and higher central to understanding this large-scale coniferous vegetation) education. Like Doyle, she was grouping, which includes markers marvelously exploits circular active in securing admission of for his wife, parents, sister and organization to crown the site. women to Brown University. brother-in-law, and nephew and his Holding the center is a marble In the year preceding her death wife. Bates’s own angular, dark- monument based on the Greek she was still active, penning an grey stone, by far the most severe, fourth-century B.C.E. Choragic article in support of women’s becomes the focal point of the Monument of Lysicrates, designed suffrage for The Woman’s group, with other stones playing off by James Bucklin (who used the Journal. blue, tan, and green variations of same source for the lantern atop grey slate and granite, modulations Downtown Providence’s Beneficent of early eighteenth-century Congregational Church, which tombstone shapes, maintains a and the-best-quality plot in the carved decoration, cemetery for distinguishable the burial of by depth and its ministers). elaboration. The Grosvenor family plot (12) presents a grouping similar in quality but visually quite different. 4 21 38. The most impressively 4. Located at the eastern landscaped lot in the cemetery terminus of Holly Avenue is that of the Aldrich family. and at what is now the center It rises in modern terraces, of the grounds, this statue- all framed by dry-laid flat-cut topped obelisk marks the granite walls, above Beach burial site of Jerothmul B. Avenue on a hill overlooking Barnaby (1830-1889), a the Seekonk River. The central highly successful dry-goods section is devoted to the merchant, his immediate progenitors of this powerful, family, and descendant influential family. Abby Pierce Barnaby Keeney (1914- (1845-1917) and Nelson W. 1980), Brown University Aldrich (1841-1915), United President (1955-66). Stylish States Senator (1881-1911); elected Romanesque columns girdle overall design. Moreover, the play to fill the seat of Ambrose Burnside 3. Designed by Norman M. Isham, the plinth, and the base and cap of between asymmetry and carefully (34), following the latter’s death); who began his career in Stone’s the smooth obelisk are embellished established axes establish a on the same terrace are three of office, the Alfred Stone Memorial, with Néo-Grec friezes. The statue vigorous, yet always pleasing and their children who died young. Up pays tribute to the architect who at top is a standard allegorical comfortable organization, gentled the hill to the south is the grave of served as a cemetery Director figure of mourning, (compare with by the varied vegetation. Lucy Truman Aldrich (1869-1955), from 1876 until his death, the last that in the Lippitt plot, 8), a female a major collector of Orientalia, twelve as President. Stone (1834- figure holding a wreath. The now housed in the Museum of Art, 39. Appropriately adjacent to the 1908), among the first generation monument’s orientation toward Rhode Island School of Design; Aldrich lot is that of Marsden of professional architects as we the east, facing the pond down the hill to the north is that of J. Perry (1850-1935), Nelson understand them today, and not the entrance, William T. Aldrich (1880-1966), Aldrich’s political and business took a keen interest from what was then one of the best and most overlooked ally. Perry lived in the John in planning and land the western edge of the early twentieth-century East Coast Brown House (1786-88) from use issues. He played grounds, recalls the architects. The terracing of the 1902 until his death, and his tomb, a key role in guiding cemetery’s expansion lot was executed by Forest Hills with the cemetery’s best view of the cemetery’s late and reorientation. Nursery in Cranston during the the Seekonk River, reproduces nineteenth-century early 1970s, and most of the stones full-scale the principal entrance of expansion continuing the were carved by the John Stevens his house. precepts of the original Shop in Newport, the country’s design. His burial site oldest continuing stone- is also included in this cutting shop, responsible guide (11). for the best carving in the country, including the Vietnam Memorial on the Mall in Washington. The consistency, not identicality, of the granite markers, subtlety varied and carefully placed, enhance the power of the

22 3 the southwest end 40. The compositionally of the cemetery, striking and commandingly complements the sited Lownes monument style of the existing features a fine bronze sculpture administrative and by Isidore Konti (1862-1938), service buildings. It a Viennese-born artist who contains a chapel studied at that city’s Imperial with seating for Academy. He came to the 100 people, a United States in 1890 to work family room, indoor on decorations at Chicago’s columbarium and World Columbian Exposition mausoleum with an (1893), established a studio array of interior and in New York, and regularly 41. Frank Foster Tingley (1844- exterior crypts. exhibited at the Philadelphia 1921) was a third-generation Academy of Fine Arts; his work member of Providence’s most 2. Immediately inside the gates prominent and long-lived stone- is a random-course granite-ashlar In 2014, the crematory was is in the collection of New York’s renovated and expanded. It houses Metropolitan Museum of Art. carving firm, Tingley Brothers, complex including office, chapel, established in 1811 by Frank’s reception room, mausoleum, a larger committal chapel, and Edgar John Lownes (1870- a viewing room for cremation 1924) was a textile manufacturer grandfather Sylvanus and his crematory, and columbarium. brother Samuel Tingley. Frank The original office-and-chapel committal. Also constructed with strong ties to the design and was a new reception hall that music communities. His wife, trained with, among others, building (1906), designed by architect Alfred Stone (2, 3, 11), Stone, Carpenter & Willson (while has comfortable seating for 80. Therèse Kaffenburg (1877- This room is a popular choice for 1970), presented at court before and the family-firm’s monuments Stone was cemetery President; within the cemetery are numerous, see 3 below) in the manner of late post funeral gatherings. A new Queen Victoria, became an early freestanding columbarium offers advocate for women’s suffrage; an and often signed. The curved Gothic vernacular buildings of the bench Tingley designed for textile English countryside, established a interior and exterior niches to accomplished pianist and soprano, accommodate the rising trend of she married, after Lownes’s manufacturer Lyman Bullock Goff design vocabulary for this complex (1841-1927), probably following appropriate to a rural cemetery. inurnment. death, Dr Eugene A. Noble, the first president of New York’s the early death of his only child, Additions to this building include Lyman Thornton Goff (1868- those by John Hutchins Cady in Both units were designed and Juilliard School of Music. Given constructed under the direction of the Lownes’ interest in cultural 1900), is reminiscent in form of the 1947 (also a cemetery President) monument designed by Richard and Architectural firm Haynes de Haynes de Boer Associates. activity, their selection of a well- known sculptor is not surprising. Morris Hunt for August Belmont Boer Associates in 2002. in Newport’s Island Cemetery, then The Crematory, just repeated for the memorial to Hunt north of the Chapel and built in 1898 on New York’s Fifth Office, was designed by Avenue between 70th and 71st Donald Prout Associates Streets. The highly architectural and completed in 1991. quality of this monument, very much in the tradition established In 2006, Swan Point by Tefft half a century earlier Cemetery opened the (10,18), works especially well Redwood Mausoleum/ here, with vegetation and stone Columbarium/Chapel. wall of the cemetery’s northern The building, located in edge just behind.

2 23 43. Dramatically located in the middle of a triangulated intersection, like Lippitt (8), the Sayles Lot features a wonderful small temple- like structure at its south end, but most remarkable is the bronze sculpture created as a memorial for William Clark Sayles (1855-1876), who died while a student at Brown University. His parents employed German-born sculptor Henry Baerer (1837-1908), who exhibited at the National Academy of Design 42. One of the more intriguing monuments in the cemetery is City’s parks, to design a pensive this minimalist circular form, a monument highly reminiscent of testimony to the ability in the that by Michelangelo for the tomb late twentieth century of the of Lorenzo de’Medici in the New funerary-sculpture tradition Sacristy of San Lorenzo in Florence. to retain a fresh Like Lorenzo, Sayles and vivid focus, died young, and his beyond standard mortuary monument is monumental undoubtedly the most types. Erected to sublime of those to the mark the grave of many young women Paul Krot (1919- and men who died far 1992), a professor too young and far too of photography often. at Rhode Island School of Design. Its form and materials respect the size and materials of those surrounding it, but its form invests with new meaning

otherwise traditional monuments.

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