Category: Photography

Pine Cleaners Inc.

Pine Cleaners Inc.
Pine Cleaners Inc., 237 Franklin Street, Jefferson County, Watertown, New York. Established in 1989. Not sure if it’s still in operation – building looks abandoned.
Advertisements

Left Unspoken

Left Unspoken
Monument to Maj. Gen. Joseph B. Carr in Oakwood Cemetery, 50 101st Street, Troy, Rensselaer County, New York. During the Civil War, Carr commanded a brigade in the Union Army of the Potomac at the battles of Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, and Gettysburg.

He was wounded near the Peach Orchard at Gettysburg and went on to command a division in the Union Army of the James. He was promoted to major general in March 1865, just before the end of the war. He also served as Secretary of State of New York for five years.

This 300-acre cemetery was established in 1848 and designed in rural style. It offers a beautiful view of the Hudson Valley and contains the remains of over 16,000 people, including Samuel “Uncle Sam” Wilson.

The Funeral Portrait

The Funeral Portrait
Bronze door knocker on the Crouse family mausoleum in Oakwood Cemetery, 940 Comstock Avenue, next to Syracuse University, in Syracuse, Onondaga County, New York. John Crouse (1802-1889) was a corpulent German-American grocer and banker who established the “John Crouse Memorial College for Women” at Syracuse University. He was once the wealthiest citizen of Syracuse, estimated to be worth $10 million in 1889. His son, John J. Crouse, Jr. (1834-1886), became mayor of Syracuse.

A gruesome spectacle unfolded in 1988, nearly a century after John, Jr.’s death, when a Syracuse University student stole his skull for art class. His fellow students called the cops when a foul smell from his attempt at cleaning the skull permeated their dorm. When investigators traced it back to the Crouse mausoleum, they discovered vandals had destroyed the interior, smashed coffins, and scattered body parts all over the floor. What a bunch of animals.

Oakwood Cemetery in Syracuse, New York

Oakwood Cemetery, at 940 Comstock Avenue, next to Syracuse University, in Syracuse, Onondaga County, New York, was designed by landscape architect Howard Daniels and opened in 1859. It is a secular Victorian “rural” or “garden” style cemetery where over 60,000 people are interred in 160 acres. This is by far the most interesting cemetery I’ve ever visited in the U.S., with Gothic and Victorian mausoleums and family plots dotting undulating, wooded hills. It’s positively Tim Burtonesque in some areas.

Time Waits for No One

Henry Winfield Chapin (1867-1954) and his wife Marie Arnold Chapin (1873-1956) are interred in the shadow of these beautiful Greek Corinthian columns. Henry was president of the Brown-Lipe Chapin Company, which manufactured automobile parts for Ford Motors and Yellow Cab.

Patterns in the Ivy

Broken headstone for Marion Strong White (1844-1875). Marion was the wife of Horace K. White. She was a wealthy and by all accounts graceful and intelligent socialite, and died of illness at the young age of 30.

Continue reading “Oakwood Cemetery in Syracuse, New York”