Posts Tagged ‘new orleans cemeteries’

I’ve been combing Lafayette No 1 looking for a particular tomb for a researcher, doing just a little at a time because…well, because it’s summer in New Orleans, which means it’s insanely hot. You have to pace yourself, so I stay through 1 bottle of frozen water. I know, that’s not a typical measurement of time, but it takes about an hour and a half for the bottle to go from frozen to evaporated- long enough to be productive, short enough to leave you standing.

Normally, that would give me enough time to cover a lot of ground, but there have been a surprising number of visitors*, and when I hear them wondering aloud what this-or-that is, I fill them in. Often it becomes a sort of mini tour, so there’s less tomb searching and more talking. I go back the next day, carve out another area, and set to it. I don’t mind – I enjoy chatting with everybody, and it’s been a lot of fun to find out how interested people are.

So it’s great. But it’s still hot, and I’m a girl who likes her A/C. So when I moped around the corner clutching desperately to my few droplets of water and saw this guy, an ancient aphorism came to mind…

I once cried because I had no shoes, then I met a man with no feet.

This is a job I really wouldn’t want:

Hot? Merciless? I can’t imagine what it must be like to be up there all day long in the direct sun. Plus, doesn’t that look like an exterminator’s canister he has up there? Eeek. Doesn’t bear thinking about.

Walking around chit-chatting while trying to stay under the shade of the tree canopy suddenly seems like an absolute walk in the park…which, come to think of it, it sort of is.

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*Typically the only people looking to task walking tours in July/Aug are either masochists or they enjoy a full time sauna. If you’re a fan of drinking your oxygen, August in New Orleans is for you.

Despite being only 15 when the Civil War broke out, Captain James Dinkins served in the Confederacy under several commanders (most notably Bedford Forrest). He was the youngest commissioned officer in the Confederacy, fighting in 27 battles over the course of the war.

Born on a Mississippi plantation, Captain Dinkins returned home from battle to find his family’s fortunes had fallen. The first thing he did was scrape up cotton to sell so the women of the house could have bolts of cloth to sew clothing as theirs was badly tattered. For several years he farmed the family’s land to get them back on their feet before travelling the rails as a railroad-man. Eventually he settled in New Orleans to become a businessman, founding the Bank of Jefferson in 1900.

The Captain is buried alongside his wife, Sue. They fell in love not long after they met at age 10, and he knew immediately he wanted to be wed. Her family said she was too young, but he continued to ask, dozens upon dozens of times, for her hand in marriage. Her parents finally allowed the match when they were both 21, and they remained devoted to each other until she died a month before their 68th anniversary.

His final birthday- his 94th- was held at his St. Charles Avenue mansion and was marked by his annual party. The press attended and asked him his opinion of the world’s pre-World War II tensions. He said “No, we are not going to war. The last one was too devastating.” It was noted that he still read the papers every day and kept up with current affairs, being in generally good health.

Sadly, two months later, while visiting his daughter in South Carolina, he slipped and fell, becoming bedridden and entering his final decline.

At the time of his death in 1939 he was the oldest ranking member of the Confederacy, and the last remaining member of the Army of the Tennessee. The Captain remained active in Confederate causes up until the end, attending reunions and writing a book about his years in service called “1861-1865 by an Old Johnnie.”
Captain Dinkins was buried in his Confederate’s uniform and the grave is watched over by two sad-eyed German Sheppards.

The Louisiana Landmarks Society has found that the roots of centuries old oak trees are doing irreparable harm to Lafayette Cemetery and has placed the site on the ‘New Orleans 9′- their annual list of most endangered sites in the city.

Typically places that make the list are structures they hope to save- this year’s list includes Professor Longhair’s home among others- but 2010 also boasts some broader initiatives, like saving the entire Mid-City neighborhood, about to be bulldozed for the new hospital complex, and abandoned churches around the city. Given the broad scope it’s not that surprising that they’d target an entire cemetery.

There are lots of trees throughout the cemetery, and although they make for some lovely shade and gorgeous photos, you can see how they could become a problem. I’ll be documenting the trees and their layouts over the next few weeks in case they start getting cut down out of necessity.

(sorry for the break I had to take- details here if you’re interested, but life’s calming down now, and it’s back to business.)

I’ve always loved the expression on the mourner holding lilies on the Miller tomb in Greenwood, but it wasn’t until I got closer that I realized that the theme was carried down all the way to the keyhole cover:

Every time I look at her, I wait for the eyes to slowly open…

A few months ago there was a lot of work going on in a central portion of the cemetery, but none of the workers spoke English, so it was hard to say exactly what they were doing.

And then there were whispers. A friend’s sister came to town and someone mentioned to her that a star was having a tomb built. Someone else sent me an email to ask if it was true. Dimensions were discussed…measurements that sounded all out of whack.

But when someone sent me a link to a TMZ story I knew it was time to go out and take a look, and… oh…my.

Nicolas Cage has built himself a temple.

Yep. Huge one – maybe 10, 12 feet high. In the middle of crowded, jumbled, old old St. Louis No. 1.

It needed lot of bracing and shoring up, so now there’s a huge concrete bib all around it. I’m going to have to dig through my old photos to see if/how many long standing tombs were lost to build both tomb and support, and though I’m really hoping for the best,it’s a very crowded cemetery and that pyramid takes up a lot of real estate.

I guess I’m not understanding the point here. If the goal was to be buried in St. Louis No. 1, he could have bought one of the tombs that are in need of renovation, fixed it, and still had an intact authentic piece of history. If he was after something impressively massive he could have bought a new plot in any of the cemeteries- if he wanted something more elaborate, Lakelawn would’ve been happy to accommodate him.

I may not be a fan of this particular tomb, but Nic Cage definitely rocks the city. He’s always around at local restaurants, not making a big deal of himself, just having fun, and he’s in the right place for that for sure. Plus we all hope he’s going to in New Orleans, given his spate of repossessions/foreclosures and a nasty bunch of litigation with his financial advisors.

Here’s the tomb’s opening- I assume it will have a slab over it and his name in the bars above:

I was out the other day, just before the weather started to turn, leaving everything a sullen grey. The skies in New Orleans are so low that much of the time it seems like you can reach out and touch the clouds.

I never really paid much attention to the skies before I moved here- there was the occasional amazing sunset, sure, but it just wasn’t the same sort of constantly changing canvas.

So if it seems like I post a lot of pictures that are basically a contrast between earth and sky, well…sorry, but I just can’t help myself.

This week I was asked if I would go out and take a photo of Fleming Cemetery, a tiny cluster that sits right on the edge of the bayou on the Intracoastal Waterway. Given all the horrible flooding upstream there was concern it might be in danger of the rising waters.

Thankfully all was calm, the water not even seeming particularly high, and certainly no faster than usual.

Here you can just see the water running behind the graveyard:

And here’s a view from across the waterway:

As you can see there’s a slight levee that’s been built at the waterline, and the cemetery’s actually several feet above the current, so hopefully all will be well- both for the cemetery and its living neighbors.

The sturdy concrete tombs are built to withstand flooding, but there are many smaller markers and personal items throughout the graveyard that would be lost if the waters rise.

I’ll keep an eye on it and report any changes… but in the meantime I’m very, very pleased to find myself unable to contribute to an article tentatively titled “Swept Away.”

As mentioned here, there was no segregation in St. Louis No.1, the oldest existing cemetery in the city.

In a nearly all Catholic city, the main part of the cemetery had a huge variety of tombs, in all materials, in all shapes and sizes…while the Protestant section looked like this:

Just a little different, wouldn’t you say?