Loren at Cypress Lawn
For 10 years, I edited Morbid Curiosity magazine. Scribner published Morbid Curiosity Cures the Blues: True Stories of the Unsavory, Unwise, Unorthodox, and Unusual, a collection of some of my favorite essays from the magazine, in 2009.
This year will bring Wish You Were Here: Adventures in Cemeteries Around the World, a collection of my travel essays which originally appeared in Travelers’ Tales: Paris, Gothic.Net, Morbid Curiosity, and on Morbid Outlook, among other places.
My fascination with graveyards goes back a way. In the 90s, I edited Death’s Garden: Relationships with Cemeteries. Spanning the globe from Argentina to Wall Street, 27 photographers and authors documented the residences of the dead. Authors considered teenage suicide, the death of parents and friends, their own mortality, the transience of fame, and the nature of death itself. The book has been out of print for years, but used copies occasionally turn up on Amazon: Death’s Garden: Relationships with Cemeteries
In addition to writing CemeteryTravel.com, I’m busily exploring the historic and pioneer graveyards of the San Francisco Bay Area.
Having cemetery adventures of your own? I’ve made a notebook in which to record your field notes and observations. The Cemetery Travels Notebook features 80 lined pages, interspersed with 20 lush full-page color photographs of cemeteries from Paris to Tokyo, with stops at Sleepy Hollow, San Francisco, and all points between, to inspire your wanderlust. You can order a copy from Blurb.
I’ve been a member of the Association for Gravestone Studies since 1999. I joined the Association of Graveyard Rabbits in Summer 2011. You can follow my cemetery discoveries on the web at StumbleUpon and Pinterest.
Earlier this year, I was honored to speak at Colma, California’s lovely Cypress Lawn Memorial Park. You can see their whole series of free lectures here.
You can email me through About.me or leave a comment below.
Hi Loren, I enjoyed your blog. I too love cemeteries. I’m an author and photographer and spend much of my time photographing cemetery monuments. I read epitaphs and research some of the more obscure occupants to bring their stories to life. I also advise on grave symbolism and am involved with monument restoration and preservation to help future generations enjoy an important part of our history and heritage. I have published a series of books, Silent Cities, about cemetery monuments as well as The Lost Language of Cemeteries about grave symbolism.
Jeane Trend-Hill, Essex UK.
If I were to start with one of your books, what’s the best one to begin with? I see that Lulu is having a sale…
Apologies for the incredibly late reply. Lulu are having a sale again (LULUBOOKUK305 at the Lulu checkout if you are in the UK or LULUBOOK305 from the USA. Offer expires 31 January 2012.)
I would recommend The best of Silent Cities: http://www.lulu.com/product/lulustudio-photo-book/the-best-of-silent-cities/11492872
I am so pleased I have found your blog again. Best wishes on your future endeavors,
Jeane
Loren, you have taken tapophilia to glorious heights! Visit us at Riverside Cemetery (the one in Macon, Georgia-there are dozens of Riv Cems across the nation. Some states, like Massachussetts, have a Riv Cem in each of several little towns along a river that winds through the state. )
Our landscape was designed by Calvert Vaux in 1887. Resting here are famous sports figures-boxer William Lawrence “Young” Stribling and “Miracle Man of the Diamond,” George Stallings, Sr. There is a man who was buried standing up in observance of an easter rite. The gypsy queen of North America was laid to rest with hundred dollar bills rolled up between her fingers. A woman born into slavery who died during the Great Depression was buried on the family lot of a prominent white family by their scion, a man whom she had cared for in his childhood.
Come to Spirits in October, when visitors go back in time as costumed actors at graveside put a human face on history.
Oh, Riverside looks lovely! Thank you so much for the invitation. I’m not as familiar as I should be with the cemeteries of Georgia. I think it’s time to plan a road trip!
I am the former Curator of Mission Dolores in San Francisco (1999-2004). I recently came upon your article on the cemetery at Mission San Francisco de Asis. Yours is one of the best written and factually accurate descriptions I have seen to date. Great work and well done!
Thanks so much for your note! I took one of your tours with the San Francisco Historical Association, which I very much enjoyed. Thank you for your efforts on behalf of the mission.
I love this site! And on just about every vacation we visit a cemetary or two. I love how they photograph. I was a grief and bereavement counselor for years, and sometimes would visit cemetaries with clients. Great stuff.
Thanks so much for stopping by! What’s your favorite cemetery you’ve seen on vacation?
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Thanks for liking my post re tombstone epitaphs, a challenge of WordPress’ Daily Post. You’ve a very unique blog and are obviously somewhat of an expert on the subject of cemeteries. Sometime ago I wrote a post about visiting California’s Forest Lawn Cemetery in the hopes of seeing Michael Jackson’s burial site. Of course I was only able to see the building, which was fine. But I was thrilled to sneak behind the chain that was suppose to keep tourists out, and get up close to the vaults in which the bodies of Clark Gable and Carol Lombard rested, as well as other Golden Age celebrities’ remains lay. It may sound morbid, but I was thrilled!
keep up the good work…hugmamma.
I haven’t been back to Forest Lawn since Michael was buried, but I was really disappointed that his grave is off-limits. I can’t believe he would want people not to be able to visit.
Thanks for sharing your memories!
Hi Loren, Are you familiar with my books, Ghosts In The Cemetery and Ghosts In The Cemetery II, Farther Afield or my website with photos from my books – http://www.wordcraft.net ? If not, please check them out. I travel around the World shooting cemeteries. My next book (just finishing it up) covers California, Chile, Minnesota, Georgia, Boston, and other place. The books are full of large full color photographs. Stuart
Thanks for the link, Stuart. I have seen your photos around — on Facebook? — but I haven’t seen your books before.
Loren, You are fabulous!!! Your lecture at Cypress Lawn was interesting, informative and ingenious!!!! I learned a lot about history and other facts about cemeteries, some I knew about but other info I did not. Hope there will be a part two next year!!!! Or sooner!!! Erik
Thanks so much for coming, Erik! It meant a lot to have supportive people in the audience. And it’s always good to see you!
While we haven’t been to any of those famous plceas, we do hit the cemeteries when we travel and actually when we lived in Savannah close to home. The Pioneer Cemetery and Bonaventure are just beautiful and fascinating. Here in Oregon there are lots of little town plots that tell the most wonderful stories too. I love the stonework and statuary too.
Your passion for cemeteries intrigues me. Interesting work you have
Love your posts, Lauren. There is so much to learn! Please visit our historic San Fernando Pioneer Memorial Cemetery in Sylmar the next time you are in L.A. I’ll give you a tour. We are home of the upcoming Ghost Girls television show, and we are trying to preserve/restore this heavily vandalized graveyard and open it for educational tourism. One long-lost headstone stolen in the 1950s was returned to us recently, but we don’t know where “Emiley” belongs….so sad.
Thanks so much for the invitation! I feel the way you do: there is SO much to learn. I can never see enough cemeteries — and I look forward to seeing yours.
Hi I got here via Jo Bryant and you have a fascinating blog. I also like to visit cemeteries and walk most days in my local one. Just wanted to share this one with you in case you haven’t been. http://lucidgypsy.wordpress.com/2011/11/10/gallipoli-and-anzac-cove-in-remembrance/
It’s a pleasure to meet you! I haven’t been to Turkey yet, though I hope to some day. Thanks for pointing me toward your lovely photographs.