A Walk Through Argentina’s Most Exclusive Neighborhood

 From the color and rhythm of La Boca, we move on to the most affluent areas in Buenos Aires called Recoleta. And within this affluent area lies the very impressive Recoleta Cemetery.

(photograph courtesy of GotoBuenosAires.)

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Inside Lincoln's Tomb

 The Lincoln Tomb is the final resting place of Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of the United States; his wife Mary Todd Lincoln; and three of their four sons: Edward, William, and Thomas. It is located in Oak Ridge Cemetery in Springfield, Illinois.

Constructed of granite, the tomb has a tall, story-and-a-half base in trapezoidal form, surmounted by an obelisk, with a semicircular receiving room entrance-way on one end and a semicircular crypt or burial-room opposite. On the exterior, four flights of balustraded stairs lead to a level terrace. The balustrade extends around the terrace to form a parapet, and there are several bronze statues, reliefs, and stone carvings located at the base of the obelisk. The obelisk rises 117 feet (36m) high.

A bronze recasting of Gutzon Borglum's head of Lincoln stands on a pedestal in front of the entrance way; Borglum's original marble bust is in the U.S. Capitol.

 A down-scaled bronze prototype by Daniel Chester French of his 1920 statue in the Lincoln Memorial, in Washington, D.C., dominates the entrance foyer.

Corridors lead from the rotunda to the burial room at the rear of the memorial.

 

 Located in niches along the corridor walls are statues by prominent sculptors depicting various phases of Lincoln's life.

 The burial room features marble walls and a ceiling of gold leaf. At its center stands the memorial monument, a 7-ton block of reddish marble inscribed with Lincoln's name and the years he lived. It marks the approximate location of the burial vault, which is 30 inches behind and 10 feet below. Nine flags are arranged in a semicircle around the cenotaph. Seven of them—the State flags of Massachusetts, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana, and Illinois—commemorate the homes of Lincoln and his ancestors.

The tomb was built with additional crypts for members of Lincoln's family in addition to the four spaces already used. However, as the remaining members of Lincoln's family chose to be buried elsewhere, the other crypts remain empty.

 

Gutzon Borglum's head of Lincoln. 
The nose remains shiny due to the tradition of rubbing Lincoln's nose for good luck.

 

 

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A Visit to Oakridge Cemetery and Lincoln's Tomb

 "Formal burial in the United States, prior to 1860, was primarily restricted to interment of the body on the grounds of a church or meetinghouse, or occasionally within the church itself. The bell of the church was rung during the last hours of life, and after death, in an effort to keep evil spirits at bay, and to give the departing soul some advantage upon its way. The body was, in English tradition, placed in a casket. Graves were laid facing east and west, with the head to the west; all available space was used, with burials very close together, and at times on top of each other. As burial was within the church yard, tombstones were commonly seen on meeting day, reminding the congregation of the dead, and again, of death’s inevitability. Headstones were, if afforded, carved with representations such as death’s head or Father Time extinguishing the candle of life; and also carried verbal warnings of mortality, and of the necessity for virtue, such as: “Fugit hora” (time flies) and “Memento mori” (remember that you must die). Cemeteries were dreary places affording little room or light for vegetation, and thereby not encouraging the passerby to linger and to appreciate."

" As the 19th century progressed, towns grew to cities, and population increased proportionally. For reasons of public health and overcrowding, burial grounds began to be located outside of population centers, no longer on church ground. These cemeteries spawned the “Rural” Cemetery Movement."

"The rural cemetery was designed with romantic vision, based upon English landscape gardening. Nature, in contrast to an increasingly urban setting, was idealized and sought out; trees were a necessity, including evergreens, spruce and pines, and deciduous varieties."

 

  "The first official cemetery established for Springfield residents was the City Graveyard, four acres of land donated by Elijah Iles in the 1820s. Around 1830 John Hutchinson laid out a tract of six more acres adjoining the City Graveyard to the west. For many years, Hutchinson’s Cemetery was the primary burial ground for Springfield, located five blocks west of the State Capitol.

In June 1855, Charles H. Lanphier, a member of the Springfield City Council, advocated for the purchase of seventeen additional acres of land north of Springfield to establish a new municipal cemetery outside of the city. The city’s growth, sanitation issues, noise pollution, and need for more burial space all contributed to this demand. Springfield officials purchased seventeen acres north of the city, and in 1856 they purchased an additional eleven and a half acres to further expand the cemetery. A city ordinance was passed around this same time to prohibit the formation or expansion of burial grounds within city limits. Mayor John Cook proposed the name Oak Ridge for the new cemetery.

In 1858 the city appointed a sexton to serve as caretaker to the cemetery, and it was at this time that the cemetery began to keep records of interments. Another ordinance passed in 1866 prohibited additions to Hutchinson’s Cemetery and allowed owners of lots there to exchange them for equally sized lots in Oak Ridge Cemetery instead. Between 1865 and 1879, 652 bodies were moved from the City Cemetery and Hutchinson’s Cemetery to be reinterred in Oak Ridge Cemetery.

The city of Springfield dedicated the cemetery on May 24, 1860, and schools and businesses even closed for the afternoon. Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln are believed to have attended the event.

 Burials began at Oak Ridge well before the dedication — according to cemetery records, the first person buried there, in 1858, was Eliza Helmle, the 7-month-old daughter of Carl and Marie Flesche Helmle."

 Since 1865, the cemetery has grown to be the largest Municipal cemetery in the state of Illinois, encompassing approximately 180 acres of beautiful rolling prairie land, thousands of hardwoods and conifers, and over 75,000 interments.

Oak Ridge is the burial home of many settlers of Springfield and Sangamon County and state and local officials. There are over 50 sections and approximately 75,000 burials.

 

Oak Ridge Cemetery is the second most visited cemetery in the county, only after Washington, D.C.’s Arlington National Cemetery. Nearly one million visitors come to the cemetery each year to pay their respects. These high visitation number are largely due to Abraham Lincoln’s tomb.

 Construction on the Lincoln Tomb began in 1868, and it was dedicated in 1874 with President Grant in attendance at the ceremony. Because of major design and construction flaws, the Tomb was largely rebuilt in 1900 through 1901 and once more in 1930 through 1931. There were also security concerns after thieves attempted to steal President Lincoln’s body in 1876, so his remains were moved to a level below the floor of the burial chamber after the first renovation was completed.

 Abraham Lincoln isn’t the only notable figure at Oak Ridge Cemetery; many of Lincoln’s contemporaries are interred there as well. Oak Ridge holds over eighty dignitaries, including former governors and legislators.

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