We were wandering around Calvary Cemetery when we found this unique monument to Chief of Police Martin O’Brien. In 1919, he was wounded while chasing two “highwaymen” who had just robbed a jewelry store. He sounds like a much more hands on manager than many leaders nowadays.
Tag: Cemeteries
Old Potters’ Field Interment, Mount Lebanon Cemetery
Thirteen years ago, Toby Weiss of BeltSTL and I looked fruitlessly for the location of the reinterment of the St. Louis Potters’ Field, moved to Mount Lebanon Cemetery in 1950. This time, I came up with the ingenious idea of simply calling the cemetery on the phone, now owned by Alexander-White-Millen Funeral Home, and a…
Old St. Marcus Cemetery
Readers who grew up in South St. Louis might remember the sad abandonment and despoliation of Old St. Marcus, on Gravois Avenue just northeast of the city limits. Originally founded by St. Marcus Evangelical Church, a storied German congregation, it suffered from disinvestment and abandonment, while its counterpart, across the border in Affton continued with…
Friedens Cemetery, Late June 2026
In response to some concerns I heard about the condition of Friedens Cemetery, which I hadn’t visited since September of 2024, we took a look a week or so ago. While the grass looks to have been mowed relatively recently, there were a large number of tree limbs broken and lying on the ground. And…
End of Spring 2026 Odds and Ends
It’s that time of year, so it’s time for odds and ends! Above is a spandrel from a storefront in downtown Belleville, looking suspiciously like something Louis Sullivan would design. Below is just another house we found while driving around town. Cleveland High School is looking really, really bad compared to earlier visits; I first…
Two Cemeteries, Birmingham, Alabama
We looked at two cemeteries in the Birmingham, the first of which was Highland Memorial Gardens, founded in 1954. This is an example of a memorial park; while there are a few headstones, the vast majority of gravestones are flush with the lawn, giving a more clean and modern look that took over cemetery design…
St. Dominic Roman Catholic Church and Cemetery, Breese
St. Dominic Roman Catholic Church is the massive first parish in Breese, Illinois. Founded in 1858, the current church is from 1867. It’s a massive church, expressed in the German Gothic Revival style with a central spire and two octagonal turrets flanking. The interior, which was closed when we visited, is most likely a typical…
Hermann Columbarium, Bellefontaine Cemetery
Just a few days after Found St. Louis posted about Charles Hermann and his stately house in Compton Heights, we walked right up to his columbarium in Bellefontaine Cemetery. How’s that for luck? But this is a columbarium? It sure is small, isn’t it? As far as we can tell, the remains of the family…
Cemetery, Sancta Maria in Ripa, Lemay, and San Francesco in Ripa, Rome
Word has come down in the news media that Sancta Maria in Ripa has been put on the market for sale by the School Sisters of Notre Dame in Lemay. I’ve looked at the majestic buildings twice, first in October of 2008, and then in December of 2020. The high school buildings are not for…
Kimmswick, Revisited
Founded in 1859 by German Theodore Kimm, we thought that Kimmswick was worth a second look recently since we were in the area after having looked at it back in August of 2020. I had forgotten how many log cabins there were in the town. And judging from the National Register nomination, which does not…