Woodlawn Cemetery Bronx New York

While in New York City I visited both Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx and Trinity Church Cemetery and discovered the graves of two prominent New York businessmen, Isidor Straus, co-owner of Macy’s Department Stores, and John Jacob Astor IV, real estate tycoon, who both perished on the Titanic on April 15, 1912. As the story […]

On my three-hour walk through Woodlawn Cemetery, I discovered it spans more than 400 acres and serves as the final resting place for over 300,000 people. The many magnificent monuments and mausoleums I came across tell stories of immense wealth and prominence among New Yorkers dating back to the 19th century.

I rode the NYC subway on the #4 line all the way to its last stop at Woodlawn station in the Bronx. Just across the street from the exit, I found the Jerome Avenue entrance to Woodlawn Cemetery, where I discovered the grave of the writer Dorothy Parker. Born in New Jersey, Dorothy Parker endured […]

On my walk at Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx, New York—just a short distance from Yankee Stadium—I discovered the grave of one of the greatest horn players in history, Miles Davis. Miles’s father, a dentist, bought him his first trumpet from one of his patients. Though his musical mother wished he’d learn the violin, Miles […]

On my walk at Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx, New York City, I discovered one of the most fascinating grave monuments I’ve come across on my many cemetery walks — the grave of the great American novelist, Herman Melville, who many consider the author of the greatest novel ever written, Moby-Dick (1851). Tucked along a […]

  On my walk at Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx, New York, I discovered the grave — third from the left in the feature photo — of the great American composer and songwriter, Irving Berlin. Berlin was known for writing music and lyrics in the American vernacular: uncomplicated, simple, and direct. His aim was always […]