Calvary Cemetery, East Los Angeles
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| Details | |
|---|---|
| Established | 1896 |
| Location | 4201 Whittier Boulevard, East Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Country | United States |
| Coordinates | 34°01′42″N 118°10′36″W / 34.02833°N 118.17667°WCoordinates: 34°01′42″N 118°10′36″W / 34.02833°N 118.17667°W |
| Type | Roman Catholic |
| Owned by | Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles |
| Size | 137 acres |
| Find a Grave | Calvary Cemetery |
Calvary Cemetery is a Roman Catholic cemetery that the Archdiocese of Los Angeles runs in the community of East Los Angeles. It is also called "New Calvary Cemetery" because it succeeded the original Calvary Cemetery (on north Broadway), over which Cathedral High School was built.
When Los Angeles was originally surveyed and mapped under the leadership of Gen. Edward Ord in 1849; its graveyard was at the upper end of Eternity Street. At the lower end of Eternity was the first church in Los Angeles, the Placita. In between lay a part of town flanked by adobe houses, citrus trees, and Coast Live Oaks suitable for traditional funeral processions escorting believers to eternity. The land allotted to the cemetery lay between a creek a half block north of College Street and the toma (withy dam) beyond the northern edge of town. That cemetery was named Calvary.
All the important magnates of the country around Los Angeles were buried at Calvary, such as Gen. Andrés Pico, the hero of the Battle of San Pascual, and Don Abel Stearns, a man of many ranchos. The ravine sloping down from the west took its name; it was called "Cemetery Ravine" (now Chavez Ravine, home of Dodger Stadium). Later, a Protestant cemetery for Los Angeles was laid out atop Fort Hill, where Grand Arts High School and the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels are now.
As Los Angeles swelled with settlers, so also did old Calvary Cemetery grow in size and importance, and a chapel was built. Large in scale for the desert Southwest of Southern California, that chapel was dedicated to the memory of a patron, Andrew Briswell, who died in 1885. When conditions led to the founding of a new, even bigger cemetery on the other side of the Los Angeles River in 1896—in East Los Angeles—the property of the historic cemetery was put to other uses. At the time, many Italians began moving into the north side of Los Angeles. They founded a new church on north Spring Street in Upper Town. So many Italians moved in that that part of Upper Town became known as "Little Italy." A new, more permanent church building was sought, and parishioners found and bought the chapel of old Calvary Cemetery. The first child was baptized there in September 1904, and the chapel was formally established as a church, when Fr. A. Bucci dedicated the old chapel of Calvary Cemetery as St. Peter's Church on July 4, 1915.
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