by Paul R. Spitzzeri
Despite a significant controversy that arose in late 1895 when the Catholic Church tried to establish a new Calvary Cemetery, replacing the old one below the Elysian Hills where Cathedral High School is now, in Boyle Heights at the eastern edge of Los Angeles, a second site across city limits in what is today East Los Angeles was quickly acquired and developed. The short-lived property was a little over 50 acres, but the new one added more than 20 to that total (by contrast, the old burying ground was 12 acres) and that 72 acres came at a cost of $15,000, as reported by the Los Angeles Journal of 12 February 1896.
Seven months later, the Catholic newspaper The Tidings informed its readers that “in the matter of the new Calvary cemetery every effort will be made on the part of the management to make it an object of pride for the Catholic people.” This, however, required the assistance of the faithful, as it was added that “the place where our dead repose in the sleep of peace out to be made attractive.” Moreover, it as explained that “the spirit of the Church is to rob death of the terrors . . . for those who have no faith in the future.”
The piece continued that,
Nothing tends to strengthen the bonds of union between the living and the dead—that communion of saints so sweet a consolation to the bereaved soul—than to see the graves of the deceased made beautiful and attractive, evidencing the love and remembrance of those whose hands are still warm with affection and friendship.
What was vital to this were “uniformity and durability in the improvements” at the new cemetery “and care bestowed upon the graves” and this meant proscribing the use of wood except temporary small crosses at each gravesite’s head and foot, as well as no coping or curbing in brick, marble and stone, while it was added that “those wishing to go to great expenditure have ample room to indulge their tastes in suitable headstones and monuments.”
The use of lawns was deemed essential for the aesthetics of New Calvary, so that “it will always look becoming,” while the piece concluded that “as it is simply a matter of time when, doubtless the city authorities will require the removal of the bodies from the old cemetery,” it was also important if grave sites, whether singles, doubles, large lots or others “were secured early in the new cemetery.”
In its 31 October number, the Tidings reported that,
The new Calvary cemetery, though not yet in the condition that the management would desire, will have to be opened for interments November 1 On and after that date no burials can take place in the old cemetery.
Because of the pressures of time, it was assured that the new burial ground’s managers did everything they could to prepare for the transition “and it is hoped that the public will make due allowance for the unfinished appearance of the work.” The shot article concluded that “when the plan is completed the cemetery will be something of which the Catholic community may be proud” because “it takes considerable time” and money “to convert a barren field into a proper burial place for the dead.”
One of the earliest detailed profiles of New Calvary came in the 23 January 1897 issue, in which The Tidings praised the “beautiful design which is being rapidly developed” and noted that “the site for New Calvary was chosen by Bishop Mora, as one of the last of the many monuments which attest [to] his untiring zeal in a long and laborious episcopate [after nearly three decades, Mora ended his tenure in mid-March], and the lay of the land could hardly be excelled for cemetery purposes.” While the site as considered “somewhat distant from the center of population,” this often being desired, it was added that a streetcar line would soon reach it as part of eastward development. Today, the Metro E line runs along Calvary’s north side on 3rd Street.
To again show how much changed in cemetery management in recent years, the article repeated what was pronounced in its predecessor in that there was to be “a distinctive lawn feature” and that “uniformity of improvements and a Perpetual Care Fund” established. This latter involved an assessment at lot purchase on a scale, with interest utilized for sod, water and maintenance. Moreover, “no improvements in wood or iron will be permitted, and all work above ground—such as headstones, monuments, vaults, etc.—will be of granite or marble” with brick or concrete foundations. The result, the article remarked, was:
It is hoped that the Catholic people will appreciate and cooperate with these efforts to make their cemetery worthy of their faith, and of their love for the dead.
Concerning the earlier burying ground, it was noted that “it is possible that before long the remains in Old Calvary cemetery may have to be removed” and that “burials are no longer permitted there, and those who have friends there will need to remove them, or have families separated when others of the family die.” Those potentially in that situation were advised to go to the new grounds and choose their lots and, to help, the Church offered those who owned lots in the old cemetery a credit of half the purchase price for equal or larger property in the new one.
Disinterring and reinterring from one to the other was $10 for adults and half that for children with the box, health office-approved, provided by the family, as well as transportation. The paper also provided pricing for the perpetual care of lots in the new cemetery, ranging from $35 for single gravesites to $200 for a 400-square foot lot. Maintenance charges were from $3-$10 paid in advance and $4-$15 for those not so handled, while sodding cost from $3.50 to $20 and grading and seeing from $3.50 to $15.
As to the sale prices, these involved $10 for singles, $20 for doubles, $35-$50 for 10×10 plots, dependent on location, and 20×20 plots at $125 to $350, also based on siting. Lastly, it was stated that opening, meaning digging, graves cost $3 for children and $5 for adults. Because “the ground is very hard,” likely meaning dense adobe soil, those who wanted graves dug were asked to inform the manager a day-and-a-half in advance to allow for plenty of time to prepare the site.
The 13 March number of the Los Angeles Herald observed that “the new Calvary cemetery is receiving bodies that have lain in the old cemetery for many years” including the recent reinterment of eleven nuns and several priests and monks, including Blas Raho, the longtime prelate at the Plaza Church; Father John B. Asmuth, who was the founding president of St. Vincent’s College, now Loyola Marymount University, and others.
Lewis J. Legrand, the superintendent, was said to have “laid out all the city parks” and took his expertise with “convenient driveways, picturesque plats and flower beds” into his new job. There was also a doubling in the acreage to 144, “of which 33 have been laid out into lots,” with these established by “the recognized rules of landscape art.” The article commented that “around the outside a row of eucalyptus trees are planted, while the drives through the grounds are lined with bushy gum and acacia trees.”
A future location for a chapel was noted, as was “a stately, brick receiving vault” at the center, which gave “the appearance of a substantial church building.” Two dozen chambers, four on each side on three levels, were to hold remains until burial, and “each chamber is closed by a marble slab, while the thick masonry prevents any heat from entering.” At the north end of the property was a 90,000-gallon capacity reservoir to distribute water via pipes to all portions of the grounds, while it was recorded that there were more than 1,700 lots of 20 feet width and each along a 16-foot driveway. Landscapers worked on flower beds and other plantings.
While New Calvary progressed and has now been in operation for 130 years, with more than 200,000 persons buried among its 137 acres, the old burial ground languished and in the first years of the 20th century, there were occasional references to it. For instance, the 5 January 1902 edition of the Los Angeles Times provided a lengthy feature, with photographs (these only recently becoming common in largely replacing drawings, like those used in the late 1888 piece on the cemetery highlighted in the prior Old Calvary post), and with the headline of “An Old Los Angeles Burying Ground Fast Getting Buried.”
The piece started off with,
A weird reminiscence of the long-ago, is the old Roman Catholic burying-ground, on Buena Vista street [now North Broadway] in this city.
A strange fascination takes possession of the intruder, as he wades in among the tangled brambles, brushes away the dust and cobwebs, and peers at the half-obliterated inscriptions on quaint and crumbling tombs.
Even for those who did not under the Spanish inscriptions on gravestones, the unnamed journalist observed, “more eloquent than words are the evidences of affection that tell of heartaches left behind.” Simple wooden crosses and headboards—the type banned in the New Calvary—were also assumed to be “the handiwork of the bereft husband or father, most of them showing some mark of affection that will admit of no other interpretation,” while “evidences of floral memorials placed there in recent years bear testimony that affection knows well the resting place of its dead.”
It is notable that oil wells were on the west side of the old Calvary, reflections of the great oil boom that started a little to the southwest, near the interchange of the 110 and 101 freeways, about a decade before, and, on the east, were “the railroad yards and street-car tracks,” with the Southern Pacific’s River Station now being the site of Los Angeles State Historic Park, while the Metro A Line is the modern variant of that streetcar system.
The article went on that the cemetery “is fast passing into the last stages of graveyard-obliteration” and that “it will be a matter of only a few years until this, one of the most interesting historic spots in the city, will have been as completely wiped out of existence as is the original ‘campo santo,’ which was located about [adjacent on the south] the church of Our Lady of the Angels, near the Plaza.” It added,
Even now, in its most secluded depths, among sunken graves and blackened tombstones, shaded by great pepper trees and overgrown with grass and weeds, the mournful creak of the oil pumps, the clangor of the locomotive, the crash of the electric gong, and the din of the iron foundry is never hushed.
While it was commented that the grounds were consecrated in 1844 (the date was 3 November—182 years ago tomorrow—during the Day of the Dead ceremonies), “work was begun on the adobe wall, which surrounded the original plot, in 1839.” It was added that the earliest dated tombstones were from 1854, “but many graves have now no identifying mark.”
At the west end, sloping up the lower elevations of the hills and near “a large weather-beaten wooden cross” was an area where “little boards are thickly set, with a sprinkling of simple stones and slender crosses, all tottering and discolored.” This led the writer to wonder if “a whole orphan asylum is not buried there; there are pathetic, half-obliterated words, ‘our baby,’ ‘our darling,’ ‘nuestra hija [our child],’ and one little row, bearing the same family name, telling its own touching story.”
Another interesting portion of the piece remarked that,
The oldest section of the graveyard is heavily shaded, and here the ground is moist under foot, and the grass grows rank and untrimmed. Many of the graves are sunken and unmarked. Over others the wooden headboards are rotting and the inscriptions indecipherable. Here and there a board or cross leans against a tree or an inclosing fence. Many graves are inclosed [sic] by wooden palings, or iron fences [these also prohibited at the new Calvary]; others are covered by quaint red brick tombs.
Larger, costlier and more imposing vaults were highlighting and “the most notable is the Briswalter” and the article observed that this “was designed as a mortuary chapel for the cemetery,” though, when Andres Briswalter left $25,000 in his will it seemed apparent that the purpose was purely to inter his remains, though perhaps the use changed. Despite its fine materials and lavish interior decorations, “the side walls are now cracked, the windows broken, and the whole place forlorn,” although “the fine front is still in a good stat of preservation.”
It is unclear why, among the stone inscriptions in English, French, German, Italian and Spanish, “one is surprised at the large number of French among the pioneers of Los Angeles,” given the importance of that community in the Angel City’s history. A couple of examples of epitaphs were cited, one warning that all were to face death and the other looking forward to joining mother in the glory of eternal life. Also noted were “many massive monuments . . . rich with carved and sculpted figures and marked with names that are intimately connected with the history of Los Angeles.”
These seemed to be congregated at the north end of old Calvary, “where the trees have grown thick.” There was one monument without any names, fully 20 feet tall and “built of brick and ornamental plaster,” while “at its base is an oven-like red-brick tomb, the end broken away so that the bones of the silent dead lie in full view through the opening, surrounded by fragments of the brass-bound coffin.” A photo with caption of “A Nameless Monument of Brick and Mortar” shows a monument featured in the late 1888 article found in the prior old Calvary post and which may have been that of Teresa Garvey, the young wife of Richard, a major San Gabriel Valley figure.
Also mentioned were the final resting places of Joseph Chapman, the first Anglo to live in Los Angeles, Abel Stearns and the latter’s father-in-law, Juan Bandini, while “the tomb of Doña Isabel [MarÃa Ignacia Alvarado] Pico, wife of Pio Pico, the last Mexican Governor of California, is located in the midst of a clump of pepper trees, flanked by the vaults of the Forster [Don PÃo’s sister, Isidora, married England native John Forster and they owned much of the region around San Juan Capistrano in southern Orange County] and Williams [of the Chino area] families, all in fair condition.”
Other surnames of note were Aguilar, Apablasa, Avila, Coronel, Dominguez and Rivera “and many others of the old Spanish families,” while American and European ones included Bell, Bernard, Boyle [Andrew, the father-in-law of William H. Workman, nephew of Homestead founders William Workman and Nicolasa Urioste], Childs, Den, Lanfranco, Leonis and Williams. Hidden by weeks and low-hanging branches was the grave of U.S. Army Lt. Col. Edward H. Fitzgerald, who died in 1860, and who was remembered for his service in campaigns in México during the Mexican-American War, which included the seizure of Mexican California. It was recorded that “his grave is marked by a tall shaft, which has been broken off near the top.”
In 1901, All Souls’ Day, as this year, 125 years later, was on 2 November and the correspondent remarked that,
Many of the graves, even hose that are nameless from age, were decorated with this year’s chrysanthemums, geraniums and roses, and the faded and dried bouquets still remain. November 2, All Soul’s [sic] Day, is the “decoration day” here. Then the black-shawled Spanish women lay their tributaries upon the graves of their “parientes”—even of those who have been dead so long so that it is difficult to find a record or the outlines of the grave.
The article concluded that “the old cemetery has now become a barrier in the way of progress” and that “there are yawning openings, where bodies have been removed,” while soon all those who have loved ones among the dead of old Calvary will seek for them a new resting place.” What was unclear was “what is to become of the friendless and forgotten?”
We’ll return tomorrow with the second part of this post looking at other media references to the abandoned Old Calvary Cemetery in the early 20th century, so come back for that!