Laurel Hill Cemetery

This article is about the Philadelphia cemetery. For other uses, see Laurel Hill Cemetery (disambiguation).

Laurel Hill Cemetery
Laurel Hill Cemetery Gatehouse in 1972
Laurel Hill Cemetery is located in Pennsylvania
Laurel Hill Cemetery
Location3822 Ridge Avenue, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Coordinates40°00′14″N 75°11′15″W / 40.00389°N 75.18750°W / 40.00389; -75.18750
Built1836–1839[2]
ArchitectJohn Notman[2]
Architectural styleExotic Revival, Gothic, Classical Revival
NRHP reference No.77001185[1]
Significant dates
Added to NRHPOctober 28, 1977
Designated PHMCMay 20, 2000[3]

Laurel Hill Cemetery, also called Laurel Hill East to distinguish it from the affiliated West Laurel Hill Cemetery in Bala Cynwyd, is a historic rural cemetery in the East Falls neighborhood of Philadelphia. Founded in 1836, it was the second major rural cemetery in the United States after Mount Auburn Cemetery in Boston, Massachusetts.

The cemetery is 74-acre (300,000 m2) in size and overlooks the Schuylkill River. The cemetery was designed by John Notman and grew to its current size through the purchase of four land parcels between 1836 and 1861. It contains over 11,000 family lots and more than 33,000 graves, including many adorned with grand marble and granite funerary monuments, elaborately sculpted hillside tombs and mausoleums.[4] It is an accredited arboretum with over 6,000 trees and shrubs representing 700 species.

In 1977, Laurel Hill Cemetery was listed on the National Register of Historic Places[5] and in 1998, became the first cemetery in the United States to be designated a National Historic Landmark.[6][7]

  1. ^ "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. January 23, 2007.
  2. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference WDL1 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ "PHMC Historical Markers". Historical Marker Database. Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission. Archived from the original on December 7, 2013. Retrieved December 10, 2013.
  4. ^ National Historic Landmark Nomination, Aaron V. Wunsch, National Park Service, 1998.
  5. ^ "NPGallery Digital Asset Management System". www.npgallery.nps.gov. National Park Service. Retrieved July 7, 2020.
  6. ^ Listing Archived 2011-06-06 at the Wayback Machine at the National Park Service
  7. ^ "Laurel Hill Cemetery". www.associationforpublicart.org. Retrieved July 1, 2020.