Cemeteries with History in Minneapolis, Minnesota

Cemeteries are fascinating places to learn about the history of a region or its most important residents. Some people think cemeteries are creepy and believe stories of unusual phenomena happening by the dark of night. Minnesota's Twin Cities, Minneapolis and St. Paul, have a number of cemeteries in their suburbs but two cemeteries in Minneapolis are especially interesting for their history.

If you wish to visit either of these final resting places, be sure to find out when you are allowed to visit, go through proper channels, and be respectful while in the cemetery.

(Layman's) Pioneers and Soldiers Memorial Cemetery
The Pioneers and Soldiers Memorial Cemetery in Minneapolis, Minnesota, was once known as Layman's Cemetery. The Layman family, early pioneers who originated on the East Coast, were Baptists and abolitionists. From its inception, the cemetery was a place where anyone of any race or social class could be interred.

The 27 acres donated by the Layman family in 1853, five years before Minnesota was to become a state, contain 20,000 graves. Only eleven percent of the graves are marked. Among those interred in the graveyard are 180 veterans of various wars from the War of 1812 to World War I. Over half of the total number buried in this cemetery were children under twelve years old. Almost three thousand of Minneapolis's poorest citizens are interred in Section H, the section where only two dozen stones mark the graves. Section H also contains three mass gravesites.

In May 1919, the Minneapolis City Council created an ordinance closing the cemetery to further burials. In 2002, Pioneers and Soldiers Memorial Cemetery became one of the few cemeteries to be placed on the National Register of Historic Places.

One of the historic buildings on the grounds is the caretaker's cottage built of limestone blocks. This one story building was constructed in the year 1871 and was one reason the cemetery was placed on the Historic Register.

While this cemetery does not contain the remains of any famous Minnesotans, it was unusual for its desegregation policy. The first African American person buried here was an unnamed baby belonging to a woman called Mary Johnson. The time was May 1867. William Goodridge, born a slave and later influential in the Underground Railroad, is also buried in this cemetery.

Another non-white person buried in the Pioneers and Soldiers Memorial Cemetery is Mary Prescott. Her birth name was Nah-he-no-wenah, or Spirit of the Moon. She was fully Native American of a Dakota sub-tribe but married a white trader by the name of Philander Prescott. Her husband as well as their son are buried beside her.

The notorious are also interred in this cemetery. Two of these people known in the Minneapolis area for their criminal records in the late 1800's and early 1900's were Harry Hayward and Della Stokes. After his hanging in 1895 for first degree murder, Hayward's body was cremated in Chicago and his ashes returned to the Pioneers and Soldiers Memorial Cemetery to be buried. Della Stokes was thought by many to be a prostitute. It is known she was a petty thief and scam artist and the former was likely the reason Frank Stabbe murdered her in her room in October 1915.

Layman's/Pioneers and Soldiers Memorial Cemetery is open for visitors from April 15 to October 15 and can be found at 2945 Cedar Avenue South where East Lake Street intersects the avenue.

Lakewood Cemetery
Lakewood Cemetery in Minneapolis, Minnesota, is the city's largest cemetery and has long been one of the cemeteries in the Twin Cities where famous Minnesotans were buried. The 250 acres were once the property of Colonel William S. King. The cemetery was established in 1871.

The Memorial Chapel on the cemetery grounds is listed on the National Register of Historic Places primarily because of its interior design. Constructed in 1910, the Chapel has a marble floor and a dome which rises 65 feet above the floor. The windows are stained glass and serve as a type of sundial. The exterior was planned by Minnesotan Harry Wild Jones. The interior was intentionally designed by Charles Lamb of New York to be similar to Byzantine mosaic found in Turkey in the Hagia Sophia. Six Italian mosaic artists advised him upon their technique and created the pieces which would become the mosaic. The mosaic work includes ten million pieces of marble, glass, and stone put together with gold and silver.

The other building on the cemetery grounds which bears note is the Memorial Community Mausoleum and Columbarium. This two story structure was built in 1965 and contains 3000 crypts and 2400 niches for cremated remains. Mahogany paneling, stained glass windows, and Italian marble adorn the interior of this mausoleum. This is the place in the cemetery where sounds, sights, and feelings have been witnessed which the observers have not yet been able to explain.

Between the Mausoleum and the Chapel is a Pool of Reflection and the eight-acre man-made Lakewood Cemetery Pond is on the grounds as well. All of these are in the western section of the cemetery which lies between Lake Calhoun to the north and Lake Harriet to the south. Hennepin Avenue meanders through the eastern third of Lakewood Cemetery. Lyndale Park with its Peace Garden and band shell borders the graveyard on the south and along its western edge.

Lakewood Cemetery is the final resting place for many Minnesota political figures. It is here nine Minnesota governors, nineteen U.S. Congressmen, three U.S. senators, and two Minneapolis mayors are interred. You can find the graves of Senator Paul Wellstone and his wife Sheila and Governors Karl Rolvaag, John S. Pillsbury, and Rudy Perpich. The remains of Hubert H. Humphrey, Vice President to President Lyndon Johnson, and his wife Muriel are buried in this cemetery.

Some of the cemetery's honored dead include four Civil War Brevet Brigadier Generals and three recipients of the Congressional Medal of Honor. Aviator Charles Lindbergh's father is buried here.

Those who were known in either college or national sports are also interred in Lakewood Cemetery. These include professional female wrestler "Sapphire" Juanita Wright, college football hall-of-famers Bobby Marshall and Francis Lund, U.S. Hockey Hall of Famer Lyle Z. Wright, pro hockey players Virgil Johnson and Bill Goldsworthy, Minnesota Gophers football coach Henry Lane Williams (namesake of Williams Arena) and baseball coach Dick Siebert, and one-time Minnesota Twins owner Carl Pohlad. Major League Baseball players Paul Giel, Russell (Buzz) Arlett, and Ossie Bluege were laid to rest in this cemetery.

You can find the graves of Franklin C. Mars, the inventor of the Milky Way bar, as well as H. David Dalquist who invented Nordic Ware and the unique dessert baking ware known as the Bundt pan.

In the arts and entertainment field, those buried in Lakewood Cemetery include 50's actress Charity Grace, wildlife painter Les Kouba, Soul Asylum bass player Karl Mueller, professional skydiver Steven Forshay, and writer Thomas Heggen, who wrote the book and screenplay "Mister Roberts". Herbert Buckingham Khaury, better known as 70's icon Tiny Tim, is interred in the Mausoleum.

One of the most unusual gravestone inscriptions is for a world champion marathon dancer. A dancing ballroom couple is etched into the face of the stone and his accomplishment, 157.5 continuous days of dancing, is noted.

The cemetery contains special memorials and sections for the graves of circus performers, firefighters, members of the Brotherhood of Paternal Order of Elks, families of Chinese heritage, and a monument to the victims of a flour mill explosion in 1878.

Lakewood Cemetery and the Mausoleum is open all year round during daylight hours. The Chapel may be toured upon arrangement. The website has an excellent printable self-guided tour brochure. Guided tours may be taken during the year with free tours by trolley available on Memorial Day.

Sources
http://www.findagrave.com/php/famous.php?page=state&FSstateid=25 Famous Minnesotans and Where They Are Buried