Laurel Hill, a hidden cemetery, gets new look

The view from Robert T. Conrad's final resting spot is as glorious as any in Philadelphia.

From a rocky outcropping high above Kelly Drive, a visitor to the grave of the 19th-century mayor, poet, and playwright can look out on a two-mile arc of the Schuylkill as it winds from the northwest before rolling slowly to the Delaware. Scullers score the surface as waterbirds wheel overhead.

It is a panorama that once drew thousands to Laurel Hill Cemetery, where Conrad was buried in 1858, for weekend picnics and retreats among the monuments to Philadelphia's storied dead.

Until recently, it had been all but obscured by foliage, a victim of the neglect and confusion that can come with the passage of time.

Thanks to a serendipitous discovery a decade ago and a slow but persistent effort since, the cemetery and city have recovered a lost and inspiring vista. In the process, that stretch of Kelly Drive near Hunting Park Avenue has seen a change in character. For the first time in decades, rows of the cemetery's elegant marble and granite mausoleums, obelisks, and headstones are clearly visible from the roadway.

"If you saw this place 30, 20 years ago, you would have thought it was an abandoned cemetery," said Carol Yaster, president of the Friends of Laurel Hill Cemetery, a nonprofit group committed to its preservation. "It was not quite a jungle, but it was pretty bad. Now, by and large, people are very impressed."

It has not been easy. The small nonprofit cemetery has had to squeeze about $25,000 a year out of its capital budget, which this year was about $100,000, to trim and clear trees along the bluffs and cliffs that fall from the 78-acre burial grounds to Kelly Drive below.

A thicket of dead and dying trees, unruly saplings, and ragged ground cover has given way to sweeping ivy-covered slopes and rocky escarpments that made the cemetery one of the city's great escapes in the late 1800s.

"We are trying to preserve the historic legacy of the cemetery," said Gwendolyn Kaminski, director of development and programming for Friends of Laurel Hill. "The cemetery was more than a final resting place for the dead. It was a place of reflection and retreat for the living."

Almost from the time of its first burial in 1836, Laurel Hill was the cemetery of the city's elite. It remained so through the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Mayors and millionaires, industrialists and architects, Civil War heroes and scions of great fortunes all were buried there.

Long before Kelly Drive and cars, family members and loved ones would come by rail, horse-drawn coaches, and steamboats, said Anthony Waskie, a board member of the Friends of Laurel Hill Cemetery and a Temple professor of language and history. The crowds were so great, one needed a ticket for entry.

Over time, the cemetery lost its allure. Its sylvan surroundings gave way to working-class neighborhoods to the east. The purchase of surrounding land for Fairmount Park in 1867 guaranteed it could not expand. From the 1870s on, West Laurel Hill Cemetery, its sister cemetery in Bala Cynwyd, began drawing burials that once would have come to Laurel Hill.

The grounds grew unkempt until the 1970s and '80s, when the Friends of Laurel Hill Cemetery worked to raise funds and awareness to reverse the decline.

The group's efforts culminated in 1998, when the cemetery was named a national historic landmark.

It was then discovered that the cemetery had lost track of its historic boundaries, according to cemetery superintendent Bill Doran. A check of old maps showed that the cemetery owned the land from its fenced borders down to Kelly Drive.

"No tree work had been done for years because it was thought the land belonged to Fairmount Park," said Doran, a stone mason and native of County Wicklow, Ireland.

A survey found that more than 850 trees had grown up on the unclaimed land, creating a curtain of vegetation that blocked the view to and from the cemetery.

Over the last five years, Doran and his crew have methodically thinned that unintentional forest, culling first dead and dying trees. Given the cemetery's budget, only about 25 trees have been coming down a season.

In the last 18 months, however, the cumulative effect has become dramatic, as acres of ivy have taken hold, and more majestic vantage points have been recovered.

In fact, as recently as six weeks ago, Conrad's 16-foot brownstone obelisk topped with a granite urn would have been all but invisible from Kelly Drive, hidden behind a veil of saplings. Now, it stands like a beacon.

"I've been amazed," Waskie said. "There is much more to do, but it has returned to its former glory. This is very important because we want to draw new visitors to the cemetery, to share in the glory and history of the place."

Henry Disston (1819-1878). Founded Disston Saw Mill, developed the surrounding neighborhood of Tacony.

Louisa Knapp Curtis (1852-1910). Founder of Ladies' Home Journal.

William Crothers Dulles (1873-1912). Lawyer who went down with the Titanic and whose body was recovered.

William Elkins (1832-1903). Entrepreneur who made fortunes in oil and street railroads, and developed

much of Northeast Philadelphia.

Edwin Fitler (1825-1896). Owner of the Philadelphia Cordage Works and mayor of Philadelphia.

Frank Furness (1839-1912). Architect who designed

the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.

Henry Gilpin (1801-1860). U.S. attorney general who represented the government in the Amistad affair.

Lt. Benjamin H. Hodgson (1848-1876). Died at the Battle of Little Bighorn.

Napoleon LeBrun (1821-1901). Architect who designed

the Academy of Music and the Cathedral Basilica of

SS. Peter and Paul.

Maj. Gen. George Meade (1815-1872). Union commander at the Battle of Gettysburg.

Boies Penrose (1861-1921). U.S. senator and Republican Party boss.

EndText