USA > Ohio > Cuyahoga County > Cleveland > Historical review of Riverside Cemetery Association, Cleveland, Ohio > Part 3
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SEC. 3. This act shall take effect from and after its passage.
A. J. CUNNINGHAM, Speaker of the House of Representatives.
J. C. LEE,
Passed April 6th, 1870.
President of the Senate.
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, OHIO, Office of the Secretary of State.
I, ISAAC R. SHERWOOD, Secretary of State of the State of Ohio, do hereby certify that the foregoing is a true copy of an act therein named, passed by the General Assembly of the State of Ohio, on the 6th day of April, A. D. 1870, taken from the original rolls on file in this office.
In testimony whereof, I have hereunto subscribed my name, and affixed the Seal of this office, at Columbus, the 8th day of April, A. D. 1870.
[Seal.]
ISAAC R. SHERWOOD,
Secretary of State.
AN ACT Making Provisions for the Incorporation of Cemetery Associations, Passed February 24, 1848.
SEC. I. Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of Ohio, That from and after the passage of this Act it shall be lawful for any number of persons, not less than ten, who are residents of the county in which they desire to form themselves into an association, to form themselves into a "Cemetery Association," and to elect any number of their members, not less than three (3), to serve as trustees, and one member as Clerk, who shall continue in office during the pleasure of the society. All such elections shall take place at a meeting of a majority of the members of such association, and after notice of at least 20 days in newspaper, or by posting at least three (3) written notices at public places in the township.
SEC. 2. That the Clerk hereinafter to be appointed shall forthwith make out a true record of the proceedings of the meetings, provided for by the first (1) section of this Act, certify and deliver the same to the Recorder of the county in which such meeting shall be held, together with the name by which such association desires to be known ; and it shall be the duty of each County Recorder in the State, immediately upon the receipt of such certified statement, to record the same in a book, to be by him provided for that pur- pose, at the expense of the county, and the Recorder shall be entitled to the same fee for his services as he is entitled to demand for other similar services ; and from and after making such record by the County Recorder, the said trustees and their associated members and successors shall be invested with the powers, privileges and immunities incident to aggregate corporations ; and a certified transcript of the record herein authorized to be made by the County Recorder shall be deemed and taken in all courts and places whatso- ever within the State as conclusive evidence of the existence of such cemetery association.
SEC. 3. That the trustees who may be appointed under the provisions of the first section of this act shall have perpetual succession, and shall be capable in law of contracting, and of prosecuting and defending suits at law and in equity, and where suits shall be brought against said incorporation,
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mesne process against it may be secured by leaving an attested copy thereof with one of the trustees, at least ten days before return day thereof.
SEC. 4. All such associations shall have power to prescribe the terms on which members may be admitted, the number of its trustees and other officers, subject to the limitations set forth in the first section of this act, and time and manner of their election or appointment, and the time and place of meeting for the trustees and for the association, and to pass all such other by-laws as may be necessary for the good government of such association, and not inconsistent with this or any other statute of the State, nor in viola- tion of the Constitution.
SEC. 5. Such association shall be authorized to purchase, or to take by gift or devise, and hold land exempt from execution and from any appropria- tion to public purposes, for the sole purposes of a cemetery, not exceeding one hundred acres, which shall be exempt from taxation, if used exclusively for burial purposes, and in no wise with a view to profit. After paying for such land, all the future receipts and income of such association, whether from the sale of lots, from donations or otherwise, shall be applied exclu- sively to laying out, preserving, protecting and embellishing the cemetery, and the avenues leading thereto, and in the erection of such building or buildings as may be necessary for the cemetery purposes, and to paying the necessary expenses of the association.
No debts shall be contracted in anticipation of any future receipts, except for originally purchasing, laying out, inclosing and embellishing the grounds and avenues, for which a debt or debts may be contracted not exceeding $10,000 in the whole, to be paid out of future receipts ; and such association shall have power to adopt such rules and regulations as they shall deem expedient for disposing of and for conveying burial lots.
SEC. 6. Burial lots sold by such association shall be for the sole purpose of interment, and shall be subject to the rules prescribed by the association, and shall be exempt from taxation, execution, attachment or any other claim, lien or process whatsoever, if used exclusively for burial purposes, and in no wise with a view to profit.
SEC. 7. All such associations shall cause a plan of their grounds and of the lots by them laid out, to be made and recorded, such lots to be num- bered by regular consecutive numbers; and shall have power to inclose, improve and adorn the grounds and avenues, to erect buildings for the use of the association, and to prescribe rules for the inclosing and adorning of lots, and for erecting monuments in the cemetery ; and to prohibit any use, division, improvement or adornment of a lot, which they may deem improper. An annual exhibit shall be made of the affairs of the association.
SEC. 8. Any person who shall wilfully destroy, mutilate, deface, injure or remove any tomb, monument or grave stone, or other structure placed in any cemetery, or any fence, railing or other work for the protection or orna- ment of a cemetery or tomb, monument or grave stone, or other structure aforesaid, or of any cemetery lot within a cemetery, or shall wilfully destroy,
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cut, break or injure any tree, shrub or plant within the limits of a cemetery, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and shall upon conviction thereof, before any court of competent jurisdiction, be punished by a fine not less than five dollars nor more than five hundred dollars, and imprisonment in the county jail for a term not less than one nor more than thirty days, according to the nature and aggravation of the offense, and such offender shall also be liable in an action of trespass, in the name of said association, to pay all such damages as have been occasioned by his unlawful act or acts ; which wrong, when recovered, shall be applied to the reparation and restoration of the property destroyed or injured as above, and in all prosecutions and suits under this act, members of this association shall be competent witnesses.
SEC. 9. Nothing herein contained shall be so construed as to prevent the General Assembly from exercising the right to bar such property at any time hereafter.
FELTON
Observations and Suggestions.
BY THE SUPERINTENDENT.
The plan adopted by our Association of allowing but one monu- ment to each burial plot, and dispensing with all inclosures, save corner stones, is most commendable. At the time of opening our grounds, this feature was in marked contrast with the custom then in vogue in our other city cemeteries, yet, in the main, this new de- parture has been received with a hearty welcome by nearly all who have rightly understood the motives actuating us. The rule prohib- iting grave-mounds and head-stones, at first met with some opposi- tion. Through lack of the necessary confidence on the part of its patrons, the Association was forced by public sentiment to generally allow both mounds and head-stones of limited height. A goodly number of our lot owners, however, chose to accept the plan without delay, and cheerfully dispensed with mounds. The improved ap- pearance of their lots was so noticeable that soon, in order to meet the wishes of the majority, all grave-mounds throughout our grounds were leveled. This was a grand transition. The lawns, which had been among the early leading features of Riverside, were thereby quite restored to their original exceptional beauty.
With regard to grave markers, although the change proposed has not been so rapid and complete, we are pleased to note the steady growth of the sentiment in favor of the horizontal stone. In commending this, we are reminded that the slab lying above the coffined form is undoubtedly the earliest type assumed by the Christian monument, when marking the grave of the loved one, and it seems the most natural and expressive, marking, as it does,
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the site consecrated more exactly than the erect stone. Its in- scription can be easily read by those who stand beside the grave, and the fact that it is invisible at a distance may be counted a merit, as every hint at ostentation is thus avoided. Memory recalls the names of many famous men whose tombs are thus marked in those cemeteries of the Old World after which ours was patterned. There is a Christian humility and dignity, a simple pathos in the aspect of a stone like the one here pictured, which is measurably lost even in the most modest vertical stone ; and, viewed from a point of repose and sanctity so essential to every cemetery, flat stones are infinitely preferable to all others. When, by rule of the Association, these become universal, then will many of our lots be freed from the appearance of miniature stone yards, and the gen- eral aspect of the grounds be much improved. The erect head- stones are usually unnecessarily expensive, and not in accord with the lawn plan ; and when the purchasers have passed away, unsight- ly legacies will necessarily be left to the care of the Association. In order to protect and perpetuate the present charms of Riverside, we must carefully guard against further breaches of good taste.
MONUMENTS.
As our Rules and Regulations extend to our lot owners almost unlimited freedom in the selection of monuments, a word of cau- tion against a very common error may not come amiss. Too fre- quently do we find in most cemeteries structures of the same style and proportions erected in close proximity. In many cases where the original. design possessed peculiar merit, the very fact of its having been duplicated not only robs it of its chief charm, and re- duces it to mediocrity, but adds to the grounds an air of monotony which, in Riverside, we trust will ever be wanting. Perfect uni- formity in the designs of monuments reflects unfavorably upon the good taste and genius of their builders. Variety in material and design is most desirable, and it would surely be pleasing to all con- cerned if henceforth every monument erected in these grounds were wholly unlike all its predecessors. Better content ourselves with the plain slab marker for the grave of those we love, than to tres- pass upon the feelings of others by duplicating their memorials. People frequently have peculiar ideas about monuments, and often endeavor to secure designs that will, to them at least, illustrate
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some characteristic of the deceased, and in their selection of a de- sign, they frequently find their ideal in some monument already erected. Their natural impulse is to duplicate the admired design, without considering that their memorial will then possess no indi- viduality. Dealers capable of producing the best work are, as a rule, originators and not copyers, and it is therefore often safer to trust to their judgment than to rely on individual preferences. There is a growing desire for a better class of monumental work, possessing not only beauty and symmetry, but originality. This sentiment should be encouraged, and to this end I would suggest that the Association form a collection of rare books of designs for monuments and tombs, to be kept at the office of the Association, for reference both by lot owners and those who may at any future time desire to erect structures as memorials to their dead.
TREES AND SHRUBS.
Realizing the great extent to which trees and shrubs planted from time to time will necessarily affect the future appearance of our grounds, and feeling duly solicitous for their beauty, with a view chiefly of adding a pleasing variety of such only as are ap- propriate and desirable, the appended abridged list is herewith submitted :
TREES AND SHRUBS SUITABLE FOR CEMETERIES.
DECIDUOUS TREES. 2033793
Cherry-Double flowering.
Horse Chestnut-Dwarf.
Weeping Ash.
Kælreuteria.
Gold-barked Weeping Ash.
Virgilia Lutea, or Yellow Wood.
Purple-leaved Beech
Pinus cembro.
Copper-leaved Beech.
Weeping Linden.
Weeping Beech.
Magnolia-Chinese varieties.
Cut-leaved Weeping Birch.
Pyramidal Oak.
Purple-leaved Birch.
Weeping Mountain Ash.
Weeping Birch, Elegans Pendula and Young's Weeping.
Cut-leaved Sumac.
Japan Sophora.
Sweet Gum.
Gingko. Dogwood.
Japanese Maple.
Willows, for obvious reasons, are not desired.
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SHRUBS.
Azalias.
Filbert.
Althea-all varieties.
Rhododendrons.
Dwarf Flowering Almond.
Purple-leaved Berberry. Thun-
bergii.
Deutzia-all varieties.
Hydrangea Paniculata Grandiflora. Mahonia.
Tree Pæonia.
Forsythia.
Daphne. Upright Honeysuckle. Japan Quince. Spiræa-all varieties, especially Thunbergii and S. Van Houtte.
Weigela-all varieties. Mock Orange. Symphoricarpus. Ampelopris Verchii (climber).
Full descriptions of any of the above named can be obtained at the office of the Association.
THE CLERK'S STATEMENT
For the year ending November 30th, 1888 :
RECEIPTS.
December Ist, 1887, Cash balance. None.
From Personal Accounts for Lots
$14,327 06
Graves and Vaults 1,928 00
Receiving Tomb .
640 80
Extra Work .
537 17
66 Monument Foundations .
235 13
66 Ice, $198.70 ; hay, $23.80 .
222 50
66 Interests on Accounts 150 44
Wood $3.00 and Shrubs $2.50 . 5 50
Recording Transfers. 16 00
DISBURSEMENTS. -$18,062 60
Paid F. W. Pelton, Treasurer . $18,062 60
In account with F. W. PELTON, Treasurer :
RECEIPTS.
December Ist, 1887, Balance $ 2,694 63
Received from Clerk 18,062 60
---- $20,757 23
DISBURSEMENTS.
Paid Interest on Bonds $ 7,200 00
Sinking Fund .. 3,000 00
Labor (pay rolls) 3,708 49
" General Expenses 573 55
For " Entrance Lodge," etc. 999 82
66 " Stone Walk
574 34
Taxes
337 96
66 Drain Tile
15 60
66 66 Water Tank $20.00 and Pump $13.57
33 57
Plants. 17 17
66
66 Sawed Flagging and Brick 146 II
66 66 Perch Stone
63 50
November 30, 1888, Balance in Treasury. 4,087 12
-$20,757 23
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ASSETS.
Cash in Treasury. . $ 4,087 12 Personal Accounts. 11,288 57
Memorandum Accounts 165 55
Sinking Fund. 19,073 85
LIABILITIES. $34,615 09
Bonded Indebtedness $90,000 00
The sales of lots for the year.
$17,261 87
Total number of lots sold (to Nov. Ist, 1889) 1,137
Interments 66 66 . 3,393
N. B .- On January Ist, 1889, out of the assets, as shown in the foregoing statement, the Association retired $20,coo of outstanding bonds, thereby re- ducing the liabilities to $70,000.
NOSWVI
.19 FROSS, NO CROWN
Jamson and Gessions.
THE SILENT DEAD.
" Peace to this Place of Rest ! "Tis common earth no longer now. The gleaming sickle, and the laboring plow Here cease their toil-for holy grounds Are Gardens of the Grave-the bounds
'Twixt Life and Death-the awful bourn From whence no traveler doth return, Is peopled with dim mysteries- The Spirit Realm around us lies ! Peace to these shades! these hills and dells, Where Silence, like a Presence, dwells."
Centennial Memorial Services and Dedicatory Exercises.
The Centennial Memorial Services of Riverside Cemetery occurred on the grounds of the Association, Friday, November II, 1876, the special observance of the day being celebrated in the unique and novel ceremony of tree planting.
A large number of visitors were in attendance, and the exercises were appropriate and interesting in the highest degree. The great event of the day was the presence of President-elect R. B. Hayes, who arrived during the afternoon and assisted in the beautiful ceremony-the planting of the trees.
Guests arrived in large numbers during the latter part of the forenoon, by street car or by private conveyance, those holding special invitations meeting at the City Hall, where carriages, pro- vided by the Association, were in waiting to convey them to the grounds.
At a few minutes after twelve o'clock, Mr. Josiah Barber, the President of the Association, called the meeting to order on the beautiful mound which is to be decorated with a fountain, at the lower end of Centennial avenue, and where a temporary platform had been provided for the accommodation of the speakers. He introduced the Rev. S. H. Lee, of the Detroit street Congregational Church, who offered fervent prayer, asking the blessing of Heaven on the new enterprise. At the close of the prayer, the Arion Quar- tette sang the following hymn :
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We meet not now where pillar'd aisles, In long and dim perspective fade ; No dome, by human hands uprear'd, Gives to this spot its solemn shade. Our temple is the woody vale, Whose forest cools the heated hours ; Our incense is the balmy gale,
Whose perfume is the spoil of flowers.
Yet here, where now the living meet, The shrouded dead ere long will rest, And grass now trod beneath our feet, Will mournful wave above our breast. Here birds will sing their notes of praise, When summer hours are bright and warm; And winter's sweeping winds will raise The sounding anthems of the storm.
Then now, while life's warm currents flow, While restless throbs the anxious heart,
Teach us, oh Lord, thy power to know, Thy grace, oh Lord, our God, impart : That when, beneath this verdant soil, Our dust to kindred dust is given ; Our souls, released from mortal coil, May find with Thee, their rest in Heaven.
Rev. C. S. Pomeroy was to have delivered the address of the day, but could not be present, his absence being explained by the following letter, which Mr. Barber read :
CLEVELAND, November 17, 1876.
J. M. CURTISS, EsQ. :- MY DEAR SIR :- I regret exceedingly that the accumulation of engagements at the close of a busy week will not permit me to go with you to-day to your long-deferred in- auguration of the Cemetery. I kept the way open during two suc- cessive postponements, but now it is hedged up. I trust the weather may not hinder you this time, and that the results of your tree-planting may abide in decorative beauty for many a century. With sincere respect, yours truly,
CHAS. S. POMEROY.
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In Mr. Pomeroy's absence, Mr. Barber stated that F. T. Wallace, Esq., had consented to speak, and introduced that gen- tleman, who proceeded to deliver the following appropriate and interesting
ADDRESS.
Standing upon this field, now and forever to be consecrated to the dead, and to be adorned and made attractive for the living, we are inclined to search the records of the past for an example.
It is pleasing to find, in the history of man, an early and touching instance of that forethought and taste which impelled the Father of the Faithful to select and purchase the field of Machpelah, with the trees and the cave, as the place for the burial of his dead and the resting place of his posterity. "Bury me not, I pray thee," said Jacob, "bury me not in Egypt, but I will lie with my fathers. And thou shalt carry me out of Egypt and bury me in their burying place. There they buried Abraham, and Sarah, his wife; there they buried Isaac, and Rebecca, his wife, and there I buried Leah."
These are but natural expressions of human feeling: instinct. a spiritual impulse, surpassing belief and disdaining question. It is a sentiment possessed by every nation, tribe and human being. Love of country, and to be buried with our kindred, are the ruling passions and the last expressed desires of the human soul.
A few years since, a young man, with his wife and little two-year- old boy, left the green hills of New England to make their home upon the great prairie of Illinois. One night the Angel of Death hovered over the new home, and spread his sable mantle over the child. Where they should make his grave, was a sad question. The grave of one little child upon the boundless prairie would be loneliness itself-a flower dropt in the middle of the ocean. Be- sides, they were not permanently settled, and could not brook the thought of forsaking the grave of their child. The spiritual impulse came to their relief. Taking up the little coffin, they journeyed back to New England, and buried their first-born beside the graves of the grandfather and grandmother, in the old church- yard. Then, with saddened, but peaceful hearts, they returned, gathered up the little garments and playthings to be cherished as sorrowful mementos, and made their new home beyond the Mis- sissippi.
Who shall scoff at the nations which inherit, in common with ours, one of the noblest impulses of the human heart? Let the
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bones of Joseph be carried up out of Egypt; let the Chinaman return to the tomb of his ancestors in the valleys of the great rivers ; let the dead student from Japan be tenderly carried back to rest under the shadow of the peerless mountain, and let the children of America hold in sacred remembrance and veneration the fields and sepulchres where their forefathers and kindred sleep.
In the presence of those here assembled, it would be superfluous to dwell upon the features of attractive loveliness of this field for the place of sepulchre, or to commend the enlightened judgment and admirable taste of the gentlemen of the Association who selected and purchased it, and under whose charge this important enterprise now is; for, in my judgment, it requires no stretch of the imagination to conceive that upon that third day of the creation, when the waters were gathered together unto one place, and the dry land appeared, and God saw that it was good, the appreciating eye of Deity, looking out from the windows of heaven, first rested upon the landscape of Riverside.
It is among the sadly pleasant memories of my life that I saw the "Old Man Eloquent " laid in his granite vault at Quincy; that I have stood at the tomb of Webster, by the side of the great ocean which he loved so well; have lingered among the primeval trees at Mount Auburn, which shade the mortal remains of the matchless Choate ; have lamented Douglass, while standing by his ashes at Cottage Grove; and have dropped a sympathetic tear upon the grave of Lincoln, in the heart of the great prairie ; but, among all the cherished places of the dead, I know of none where the aspects of nature combine in greater variety, or present more exquisite beauties, than your own chosen Riverside.
A plateau overlooking a winding river, in a valley hollowed out in remote ages by the surges of an inland sea ; ravines which were once estuaries, but now woody dells, with copious springs for lakelets and fountains, and a rock of wonderful proportions, but foreign to its present bed, having migrated hither from its home in the Arctic mountains when Time was young-in the day when "God stood and measured the earth, and the everlasting mountains were scat- tered, the perpetual hills did bow."
There are sermons in stones to those who can read them. (), if that granite boulder, standing solitary and alone in the valley, could be endowed with the gift and power of utterance-could rise up
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and cry out-the mystery of creation would be solved. The elder Herschel, when asked by his son what, in his opinion, was the oldest thing in the world, picked up a pebble, saying, "There, my child, is the oldest of all the things that I certainly know." When visitors shall get bewildered in the windings and turnings in the ravines of Riverside, and shall come upon the great boulder to which allusion is here made, they may know thereby that they are hard by the chapel on the plateau-in the DELL OF THE ROCK.
Probably all great cities have some special points of attraction, either of parks, avenues or cemeteries. Cleveland is favored in all ; but in none will there be in all time so much of individual and municipal pride as in Lakeview and Riverside. It is no disparage- ment to their colleagues and coadjutors to say that J. H. Wade ' and J. M. Curtiss are especially recognized as the projectors of the respective enterprises, and for their forethought and cultured taste, generations to come will honor their memory.
This delightful abode of the dead will, in all coming time, be antici- pated by the living with cheerful resignation, and all who hope to rest here will be inspired to so live toward man and God that when the summons comes each will lie down in death as one "who wraps the drapery of his couch about him, and lies down to pleas- ant dreams."
In expressing our admiration of that modern taste manifested in adorning the homes of the dead, we should not forget our kindred who sleep in the cheerless village church-yard, or on the barren and neglected knoll by the country way-side. They are intimately asso- ciated with the earliest sorrows of childhood, and the bereavements of maturer years. They are sacred as places consecrated to our early dead-shrines to which we make pilgrimage in after years when all in the old neighborhood have forgotten us.
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