Laurel Hill Cemetery

Laurel Hill Cemetery. . , The cemetery's popularity as a final place of rest continued to flourish until at long last, Laurel Hill no longer had the ability to expand. With future financial prospects dimming, managers established West Laurel Hill Cemetery across the River in 1869. Boasting nearly 200 acres, with historic Bringhurst Funeral home located on its grounds, West today remains an active and ample site of sepulcher., In 1998, Laurel Hill became one of few cemeteries in the United States to be honored as a National Historic Landmark. Today, the Friends host visitors both local and from around the world, while promoting the site as an educational, historical, cultural, natural, recreational and aesthetic resource., IN 1978, a Philadelphia scholar named John Francis Marion shared his passion for Laurel Hill with Jane Drayton Smith, descendants of the cemetery's original founder. From their collective vision came the Friends of Laurel Hill Cemetery, a nonprofit institution dedicated to preserving Laurel Hill's past, while ensuring her present and future., Over 100,000 persons now rest soundly under Laurel Hill's perpetual care, their diverse stories adding to the ever-evolving history of a cemetery that has always embodied so much more than a cemetery. Nearly two centuries after Laurel Hill's founding, there exist few better places for the dead to rest their heads after a life well-lived, or for the living to live life well., [Captions:] , The former train station at West Laurel Cemetery transported visitors and lot-holders to Laurel Hill's sister site across the river., West Laurel Hill Cemetery's contemporary Bringhurst Funeral Home is located in Bala Cynwyd, two miles from historic Laurel Hill Cemetery., The historic Bell Tower remains West Laurel Hill Cemetery's distinguishing feature., Laurel Hill Cemetery's diminishing business resulted in the loss of most of the cemetery's original structures, including the superintendent's houses, the Greenhouse, and a Gothic Revival stone chapel designed by John Notman. These, in addition to hundreds of unique trees and horticultural specimens, became a piece of Laurel Hill's permanent pass., The on-site Greenhouse provided the mourning with an impressive range of floral options, from Easter lilies and spring plantings, to Christmas wreaths and foliage., Even in its earliest days, Laurel Hill Cemetery offered not only a place of repose for the dead, but also that of retreat and reflection for the living., The one-story chapel featured a stained glass window and an adjoined receiving tomb, used to hold remains awaiting interment., Friends of Laurel Hill founder, John Francis Marion, rests high above the Schuylkill River on the cemetery's Terrace., The Friends of Laurel Hill Cemetery's public tours and programs are a vital piece of our founding missing to preserve, promote and interpret historic Laurel Hill., A photograph from a 1907 funeral captures the variety of plantings available at Laurel Hill, while a 1917 image depicts groundskeepers at work maintaining the cemetery's lots.