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News & Events, October 2010
Dear Friend,
The Friends of Mount Auburn is pleased to present the October 2010 edition of our electronic
newsletter. We invite you to join our email list to receive this mailing on a monthly basis. To
address book today.
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Mount Auburn: An  American Parnassus
When Mount Auburn's founders looked for a picturesque site for the creation of a landscaped cemetery in the vicinity of Boston they found it nestled between Cambridge and Watertown.
Here were seventy-two acres of rolling, wooded land known to Harvard students as "Sweet Auburn." Harvard students had named this land after the fictitious town in Oliver Goldsmith's poem "The Deserted Village."
When making the decision about what to call the new cemetery, the founders chose the name Mount Auburn, a simple change from what most already called the area. Many of the early lot owners, familiar with "Sweet Auburn" from their days at Harvard, thought the name perfectly symbolized the ideals of the new Cemetery. With such a connection to poetry, even from its founding, it should not be surprising that Mount Auburn is the final resting place of numerous significant poets.
Join us on Monday, October 11th at 2:00 PM for Mount Auburn: An American Parnassus -a walking tour. From Longfellow to the Lowells, in the 19th Century, to John Ciardi and David McCord in the 20th, "Sweet Auburn", as poet Caroline Frances Orne called it, has been the final resting place of choice for numerous poets. This Columbus Day sail the slopes of this American Parnassus with us as we celebrate the first Dead Poets Remembrance Day. Nationally-renowned poets, Rhina Espaillat, Lisa Starr, and Marjory Wentworth, will lead readings at 21 poets' graves and we'll learn fascinating historical details from Rob Velella, an independent literary historian from Cambridge. This program is one stop in an all-day Columbus Day Poetry Marathon.
Columbus Day Poetry Marathon
This October 7th through the 11th 20 current and former State Poets Laureate have joined with Walter Skold, the founder of the Dead Poets Society, to initiate Dead Poets Remembrance Day, a new literary holiday that they hope will become an annual tradition."Thousands of tourists visit the graves of Emerson, Longfellow, Dickinson and other literary luminaries each year," says
Skold a poet and former school teacher from Maine who ventured out on the road 2 years ago in search of poets' graves, "But what of the hundreds of poets whose graves few people ever visit?"
The October 11th marathon will take place in six major locations around Boston, and end with a special sunset service on Author's Ridge, in Concord. "We'll be reading from 48 Massachusetts-related poets whose work spans our whole literary history," said Skold, "and we are going to break the literary land speed record of 52 Graves Per Day which we set back in May," claims Skold, who notes that such numbers can be reached because Mount Auburn Cemetery has more poets' graves than anywhere in the US.
It was during his trips in 2009 and 2010, when Skold travelled over 15,000 miles to document the graves of American poets and met 13 state poets laureate, that the idea for the holiday developed.
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 Members Appreciation Week: October 17 - 23, 2010
The first public tour of the Friends of Mount Auburn was led by Director of Cemetery Operations Roger Kindred on October 17th, 1985.
The Friends was formed to fill a need for those who wanted to share their love for Mount Auburn. Since its humble beginning, the Friends of Mount Auburn now operates a Visitors Center seven days a week, offers over 100 public programs a year and is assisted by a group of 50 volunteers!
In appreciation of the ongoing support provided by our members, we present Friends of Mount Auburn Members Week. During the week of October 17-23, we will be offering special incentives to thank our friends and supporters. Benefits include a free gift when you stop in at the Visitors Center and free admission to the following museums:
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum: Isabella Stewart Gardner (Lot 2900, Oxalis Path) first welcomed visitors to her museum on New Year's Day, 1901. Today, visitors experience much of the same thing. The Gardner Museum has remained essentially unchanged since its founder's death in 1924. Three floors of galleries surround a garden courtyard blooming with life in all seasons. The galleries are filled with paintings, sculpture, tapestries, furniture, and decorative arts from cultures spanning thirty centuries.
Fruitlands Museum (Harvard, Mass): Fruitlands refers to an experiment led by Bronson Alcott and Charles Lane which took place here in 1843. Today, the name refers to the Fruitlands Museum complex founded by Clara Endicott Sears (Lot 1847, Lupine Path) in 1914. The complex includes the first Shaker Museum, The Native American Gallery, and The Art Gallery, which contains over 230 19th century vernacular portraits - the second largest collection in the country. Fruitlands has kindly extended their offer of free admission to members of the Friends until the end of 2010!
*You must show your Friends membership card at the time of your visit to these museums to take advantage of these special offers.
In addition, those who join the Friends this week will not only be eligible to participate in all of the above, but will also be entered to win a very special gift from the Friends!!
*photo above: Roger Kindred leads tour, circa 1985 - taken by Visitor Services Assistant Jim Gorman.
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 Friends of Mount Auburn October Programs
Visit Mount Auburn this month to learn more about the history, horticulture, art, architecture, and wildlife of the Cemetery!
Here are just a few highlights from our October program schedule:
Visit the Mount Auburn Cemetery website for our full list of programs and register online today! You can now register for multiple programs in one transaction. Click on a month, select the events you plan to attend from the list, enter the number of spaces we should reserve for you at each program, and then proceed to checkout. Register online today.
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 Horticultural Highlight: Itea virginica
The children of the autumnal whirlwind bore,
In wanton sport, those bright leaves, whose decay,
Red, yellow, or ethereally pale,
Rivals the pride of summer.
-Percy Shelley
Itea virginica, the Virginia sweetspire, is one of our shrubs that often will set a high standard for fall color. This is usually a medium-sized shrub of three-to-five feet in height that normally will spread wider than it is tall. The genus name Itea is the Greek word for willow and alludes to the resemblance of these leaves to those of willows. The simple, alternate, deciduous, elliptic to oblong shaped leaves are two-to-four inches long, with a finely serrated margin and have a lustrous dark green color during the growing season. Beginning in September the leaves show hints of the dramatic crimson or maroon color that will eventually cover the plant in October. The colorful leaves often persist quite long and in some years are still present as late as Thanksgiving.
Reliable autumn color alone could be reason enough to include this plant in our landscape but there is more to enjoy. Itea virginica flowers in June and July when many other plants in the landscape have finished their spring display. While each white, slightly fragrant, flower is only up to one-half an inch in diameter, they are borne on six-inch long flower spikes arching above the leaves. Visually enticing rather than grand these flowers nonetheless are highly attractive to butterflies, as well as bees, which help to pollinate the flowers. These fertilized flowers in turn later produce small dry capsules which spill out seeds eaten by numerous species of birds. The characteristic dense habit of this shrub also provides cover for wildlife.
The species name virginica of course refers to the state of Virginia but often in plant taxonomy it is thought of more as referring to southeastern United States. Indeed this native plant occurs from southern New Jersey and Pennsylvania south to Florida and west to Louisiana and to East Texas. It often occurs bordering streams, ponds and lakes and may also be found in swamps. It will grow in full sun or shade and the stems facing full sun tend to develop a reddish color.
In addition to the native species there are several cultivated varieties available. One is Itea virginica 'Henry's Garnet' which is superior to the species in flowering and fall color and won the prestigious Pennsylvania Horticultural Society Gold Medal (Styer Award) in 1988. This cultivar was originally found in Georgia by Mary Gibson Henry (1884-1967) in 1954.
On your next visit to Mount Auburn look for Itea virginica along Rosebay Avenue, Birch Avenue, Laurel Avenue, Eagle Avenue, Halcyon Path and Oak Knoll Path among other locations. ... Come experience the beauty of autumn at Mount Auburn on Awash in Color - a fall foliage walking tour with Visitor Services Assistant Jim Gorman. Sundays October 17th and 31st at 1:00 PM. Or get your hands in the soil alongside our gardening staff during our annual Fall Bulb Planting Event on Thursday, October 21st at 9:30 AM. _________________________________________________________________
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 Wildlife at Mount Auburn Cemetery October's Little Brown JobsBy Robert H. StymeistSparrows, or LBJ's (little brown jobs), as many seasoned birders call them can be hard to see, let alone identify. Beginners often find this group of birds frustrating, but each sparrow has its own characteristics whether it is its intricate feather pattern or its versatility in its song. Fall sparrow migration as well as all the songbirds is much slower than in the spring and the birds tend to linger at a location for a longer period of time. Sparrow migration usually is underway in the first weeks of September and peaks in October and continues right up to Thanksgiving and into December.
In the fall there is an abundance of seeds and berries available-both of which comprise the majority of their diet. Most of the sparrows' favorite seeds are common weeds and grasses that we can see just about everywhere, though a bit harder here at Mount Auburn. Sparrows are more evident in open spaces such as fields and meadows but even the most manicured lawn can attract many of the species, notably the Chipping Sparrow and Dark-eyed Junco at Mount Auburn.
Two other areas to check within the Cemetery grounds on a regular basis are the Butterfly Garden at Willow Pond and the Wildflower Meadow up by Washington Tower. Many of the plantings, especially Echinacea, or Coneflower, and Rudbeckia or Black-eyed Susan, provide desirable seeds. Here you may encounter Field, Savannah and Lincoln's sparrows along with American Goldfinch and House Finches. In the Dell area look for White-throated and later in the season a Fox Sparrow or two may show up along the paths.
Swamp Sparrows can be found along the shores of all the ponds especially Auburn Lake and Willow Pond. There have been reports of unusual or rare sparrows so it is not impossible to find a Clay-colored or Lark Sparrow or a Dickcissel, a close cousin. The bird feeder at Auburn Lake hosted a Dickcissel for several months a few years ago and it's a good place to find other sparrows where they can be studied from a close distance or right from your car. Watching those LBJ's can be a lot of fun and with time they all will have a name! _________________________________________________________________ |
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 Monument Inscription Celebration
"In strolling through a country churchyard, who does not stop to read the records? And how profoundly natural it is? An epitaph publishes itself in the open sunshine to all the world; and, indeed, has a far better chance of being read, than one book out of every five hundred. It professes to inform, instruct, to war, to describe..."
- from Mount Auburn Memorial, Volume III, June 1861, P. 51
Please join us on Sunday October 24th at 1pm for our Monument Inscription Celebration. During the past spring and summer, staff and volunteers have continued the work of recording inscriptions from our most historic monuments, forever preserving this valuable information.
Join us for this leisurely stroll through one of the Cemetery's earliest developed sections as staff and volunteers share some of their most exciting recent discoveries. You will hear tales of veterans, children, those lost at sea, and other fascinating stories of Mount Auburn residents. We will end the tour with refreshments to celebrate another successful season of Monument Inscription Workshops.
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 Cemetery Services: Understanding Cremation
Mount Auburn is still a unique choice for burial and commemoration. We offer a variety of innovative interment and memorialization options: traditional earth burial for caskets or cremated remains, indoor or outdoor niches for cremated remains, and outdoor garden crypts for caskets and urns. Cremation is an increasingly popular alternative to casket burial. Mount Auburn, which has the first crematory in New England to be operated by a cemetery, conducted its first cremation in 1900. We now perform over 900 cremations annually. Join us for Understanding Cremation - a free presentation at Bigelow Chapel on
Saturday, October 23rd at 1:00 PM, with Mount Auburn Crematory Manager, Walter Morrison, Jr., who will answer any questions you may have about cremation procedures and costs. After the presentation at Bigelow Chapel, there will be an opportunity to tour the crematory. _________________________________________________________________________________ |
 Person of the Month: Hannah Adams
This month we celebrate the life of writer-historian Hannah Adams who is buried in Lot 180 Central Avenue at Mount Auburn. Born in Medfield, Massachusetts on October 2, 1755, Adams suffered from a frail constitution that prevented her from attending school. She read widely, and when her father's business failed her family took in boarders, some of whom taught Greek and Latin to Adams. After one boarder showed her the book An Historical Dictionary of All Religions, Adams was inspired to write her own unbiased version entitled An Alphabetical Compendium of the Various Sects. Her second book, A Summary History of New England (1799), was the first book to trace United States history from the Mayflower to the Constitution. The book also set off a controversy with the Reverend Jebediah Morse, publisher of a rival history also intended for school use. Having already made a name for herself as a writer and historian amongst leading Boston intellectuals, Adams won the legal case in 1809 and continued to publish works on religious history. Hannah Adams died in 1831 and her neo-classical marble monument, erected in her honor by female supporters, was the first monument to be placed at Mount Auburn Cemetery following its opening in 1831.
On the right, between Beech and Central Avenues, may be seen the monument, probably the first erected within the grounds, to the memory of Hannah Adams, and inscribed,
To Hannah Adams, Historian of the Jews and Reviewer of the Christian Sects, this monument is erected by her female friends. First Tenant of Mount Auburn. She died Dec. 15, 1831, aged 76.
The lot on which this monument stands is a very small one, and the monument itself is simple and unpretending. It will be noticed that the inscription declares that Miss Adams was the "first tenant of Mount Auburn." This is not the exact truth...Miss Adams was not the "first tenant of Mount Auburn," but the ninth, her remains having been placed in the Cemetery November 12, 1832.
- The Guide to Cambridge and Mount Auburn, 1855
Photo above: Rob Gregg (right) of Vine Lake Cemetery Preservation Trust of Medfield, Massachusetts watches Mount Auburn Preservation Craftsman Steve Brown clean the 1832 Hannah Adams monument - the Cemetery's first monument - on June 18, 2009. The Friends of Hannah Adams, the Medfield, MA Historical Society, and the Medfield, MA Historical Commission partnered to fund the project.
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If you are interested in how the Cemetery manages an ever-changing landscape with both significant horticultural collections and important works of art and architecture, join us on Tuesday, October 19, 1:30 PM Preserving a National Treasure - a walking tour to learn about our efforts to preserve the Cemetery's careful balance of art and nature. We will see examples of recent projects, visit works in progress and hear about some exciting future projects.
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Beyond Our Gates: A Program of Interest in the Community
Shaking Their Yankee Foundations: Evolving Modernist Ambitions- A symposium on influential landscape architects of the 20th century to be held on October 8th at the Lyman Estate in Waltham, MA. Nationally-recognized speakers from the public and private sectors and the academic community will provide rare insight and analysis of this unprecedented era of design - from parks and plazas to gardens and subdivisions. The program includes a full day of lectures with catered lunch and breaks. SPACE IS LIMITED.
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 Friends of Mount Auburn programs are funded in part by a grant from the Massachusetts Cultural Council.
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The Friends of Mount Auburn Electronic Newsletter Archives Homepage is your source for links to earlier issues of our e-newsletter that date back to January 2007. |
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resources. Thank you!
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You can now join or renew your membership in the Friends of Mount Auburn
quickly, securely, and easily online!
The Friends of Mount Auburn Cemetery was established in 1986 as a non-profit educational
Mount Auburn Cemetery is still a unique choice for burial and commemoration. It offers
a wide variety of innovative interment and memorialization options for all. Learn about
Mount Auburn's many burial and memorialization options. |
Friends of Mount Auburn Cemetery
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email: friends@mountauburn.org
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