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Friends of Hope to Celebrate 150 years with "Roses and
Remembrance"
Sunday, June 6, 11 am to 4 pm
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Hope Cemetery
will be 150 years old this spring and a celebration
sponsored by the Friends of Hope Cemetery will take place
Sunday, June 6 from 11 am until 4 pm. Called “Roses and
Remembrance, a Celebration of Hope Cemetery,” the day will
feature self-guided tours of our most historic sites and
mausoleums. Local nurseries, florists, and private donors
will provide spectacular arrangements and new plantings to
dress up the graves and the landscape.
In addition to
the self-guided tours, several special events are planned.
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Bill Wallace, Director of the Worcester
Historical Museum, will conduct an annotated walking tour entitled, “An
Introduction to Hope Cemetery.” A gravestone rubbing
workshop for beginners will be held and volunteers from the
Women’s history Project will conduct a tour with historical
notes about the women buried at Hope.
At one o’clock, City
officials will cut a giant birthday cake which will be
served with punch for the remainder of the afternoon. The
day promises to be fun and informative for all and Hope
Cemetery will be decked out for the festivities! We
encourage you to bring your family and friends. The event is
free and open to the public.
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Almost a Member of the Family -
An Appreciation of Victorian Pets
and
Their People
An enthusiastic group of
pet lovers joined the Friends of Hope Cemetery on Sunday,
February 22 to hear social historian and volunteer for the
Friends of Mt. Auburn Cemetery, Deirdre Morris. Ms. Morris
spoke about the Victorian era and the introduction of
animals into the middle-class household. She used slides of
art, advertising and family portraits to illustrate the role
of animals in the home as companions.
Ms. Morris also spoke about
the emerging animal humane movement, noting especially the
work of Boston lawyer, George Thorndike Angell. In 1868,
Angell, outraged at the newspaper report of a 40-mile horse
race resulting in the death of the two horses, recruited the
support of Boston’s Beacon Hill society women and
established the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of
Cruelty to Animals. Children’s literature of that period,
such as Black Beauty and Beautiful
Joe, also began to promote kindness to animals.
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Mary Johnson, Sally Talbot, and Deirdre
Morris with a pet portrait.
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advertisers began to utilize companion animals to sell
anything from victrolas to laundry soap. The Victorians
demonstrated their new relationships with their pets by
using animal statuary in family cemetery plots. Ms. Morris
illustrated this trend with examples from Boston area
cemeteries.
We are grateful to the Victorians for uplifting the lot of
animals and making pets “almost a member of the family.” Ms.
Morris entertained us with the history of this phenomenon
and we look forward to having her visit us again.
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Letter From the President
Recently,
you may have seen an article on the front page of the New
York Times entitled “Histories Vanish Along with South’s
Cemeteries.” The neglect and disappearance of small cemeteries
is an increasing problem, not just in the South, but all over
the United States.
It is unlikely that a large urban
cemetery like Hope Cemetery would disappear under a canopy of
weeds and vines but last summer we noticed the early stages of
neglect in an increased amount of tall grasses and unwanted
saplings. In response, one person commented, “I walk through the
cemetery and I hear them [the dead] crying out for help. Please
don’t forget us.”
Although Commissioner O’Brien has
issued a report on how the city will restructure the workforce
and improve the maintenance at Hope, we still must do our part
to help get this problem solved. As Friends, we must continue
our diligent volunteer efforts for restoration and
beautification. We need to work with the city and offer support
and counsel when necessary, and we need to expand our membership
to involve more people in caring for Hope Cemetery. It is
important that Hope be a fine, historic garden cemetery 150
years from today.
Ann C. Nelson
President
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Trees are an integral part of
the beauty at Hope Cemetery
Photo by Mari Seder
3rd Annual Arbor Day Celebration
Friday,
April 30th at 10a.m. at Hope Cemetery
J. Sterling Morton, a newspaper editor
in Nebraska, championed the idea of a celebrated Arbor Day in
1872. Since that time, organized efforts to plant trees across
the United States have been held to honor Morton’s efforts and,
in 1882, schools nationwide adopted the celebration. This year
the nation’s observance of Arbor Day will be celebrated on
Friday, April 30th. The Friends of Hope Cemetery will
once again host their own celebration with a tree planting at
the cemetery.
City officials will be invited to
attend and our student friends from Worcester’s Gates Lane
Elementary School will entertain us with songs and poems and
will help plant the tree.
Please join us at 10 a.m. to help us
celebrate.
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Click here to view The Hope Report, Winter
2003 |
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