Marion Cemetery Receiving Vault
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Marion Cemetery Receiving Vault
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Front and eastern side
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| Location | 620 Delaware Ave., Marion, Ohio |
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| Coordinates | 40°34′34″N 83°7′19.5″W / 40.57611°N 83.122083°WCoordinates: 40°34′34″N 83°7′19.5″W / 40.57611°N 83.122083°W |
| Area | Less than 1 acre (0.40 ha) |
| Built | 1879 |
| Architect | D.W. Gibbs |
| Architectural style | Gothic Revival |
| NRHP Reference # | 95001415 |
| Added to NRHP | December 13, 1995 |
The Marion Cemetery Receiving Vault is a funerary structure in the main cemetery of Marion, Ohio, United States. Constructed in the 1870s, this receiving vault originally fulfilled the normal purposes of such structures, but it gained prominence as the semipermanent resting place of Marion's most prominent citizen, U.S. President Warren G. Harding.
The vault is a limestone structure with a slate roof; it rests on a concrete foundation. Plans to build it were formulated as early as 1873, when the cemetery association voted to make plans for one; funds were insufficient, so the association decided not to build until sufficient money had become available. Six years later, the cemetery's trustees decided to build a vault, and to design it, they hired Toledo architect D.W. Giffs.
Among the association's reasons for building the vault was the desire to retard a modern form of grave robbery: the practice of body snatching was still relatively common, and the association wished to provide a place where bodies could be laid without risk of theft until they had decomposed so much that they would be useless to body snatchers. Accordingly, the final design for the vault included iron gates with secure locks. Other elements of the design included a double-arched ceiling, the creation of ventilation and related systems, and the placement of fine marble and carpet to beautify the structure and retard the harshness of death for decedents' family members at funerals. The entire structure is built into a hillside.
Warren Gamaliel Harding died suddenly in San Francisco on August 2, 1923 while in office as President of the United States. Mrs. Harding was forced to return to Washington, D.C. to wrap up her affairs and to move her possessions out of the White House in order to permit its new occupants, President and Mrs. Coolidge, to move in. Accordingly, no permanent burial place was employed immediately after his death, and funeral services were held at the Receiving Vault: Harding's family already owned burial plots in the cemetery, but a grander destination was planned for the deceased chief executive; in the mean time, soldiers from Fort Hayes in Columbus guarded the vault for six months. As plans were being made for the construction of a permanent presidential tomb elsewhere in the city, his body remained in the vault, being joined by Mrs. Harding's body after her death in 1924. The two continued to wait until the practical completion of the memorial in 1927; they were then moved to their permanent burial sites inside the memorial, although four more years passed before it was formally dedicated.
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