Oakwood Cemetery (Niagara Falls, New York)
| Details | |
|---|---|
| Established | February 9, 1852 |
| Location | Niagara Falls, NY |
| Country | United States |
| Coordinates | 43°05′49″N 79°03′00″W / 43.097°N 79.050°WCoordinates: 43°05′49″N 79°03′00″W / 43.097°N 79.050°W |
| Type | Public |
| Owned by | Oakwood Cemetery Association |
| Size | 18.5 acres (~1 km²) |
| No. of graves | over 22,000 |
| Website | Oakwood Cemetery Niagara Falls, NY |
| Find a Grave | Oakwood Cemetery |
| Footnotes | Staff. "NPS Focus: 14000581". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. |
Oakwood Cemetery in Niagara Falls, New York was founded in 1852 after land was donated by Lavinia Porter. It covers over 18 acres (1 km²) and over 19,000 are buried there. Notable graves include first person to travel over Niagara Falls in a barrel Annie Edson Taylor, Judge Augustus Porter, and first person to swim the English Channel Captain Matthew Webb. In 2014 it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Celebrating its 161st anniversary in 2013, Historic Oakwood Cemetery and the Oakwood Mausoleum were facing needs for the maintenance of this beautiful Niagara Falls treasure. The Board of Directors of the Oakwood Cemetery Association voted unanimously in 2010 to embark on a restoration project for the cemetery and the mausoleum. Local, state, and National Register designations are being pursued to both protect the historic site and to make it eligible for public and private historic preservation grants. A historic landscape report will evaluate the cemetery grounds and recommend a plan for restoration and a historic conditions report will accomplish a similar goal for the Mausoleum.
Historic Oakwood Cemetery was begun in 1852 on land donated by Lavinia Porter, daughter of Judge Augustus Porter. The Judge was one of the acknowledged founders of Niagara Falls, and one of its largest landowners. The original layout of the cemetery was designed by Civil Engineer T.D. Judah. The Oakwood landscape we know today dates from a design drawn in 1882 by noted Niagara Falls civil engineer Drake Whitney (nephew to the three Whitney sisters for which "Three Sisters Islands" are named.)
In 1913, Oakwood built a magnificent marble mausoleum, designed by the Buffalo architectural firm Green and Wicks. The Oakwood Mausoleum was built to the very highest standards with foot-thick walls of concrete covered by hand cut gray Vermont marble. The exterior features soaring stone columns supporting a centered entrance portico. Within were crypts for over 350 interred individuals, and the interior was faced and floored in white Vermont marble, lit by clerestory windows and two stained glass windows (one by Louis Comfort Tiffany). Huge bronze doors enter into a chapel space centered in the mausoleum.
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