Woodlawn Cemetery

400-acre Woodlawn Cemetery was founded in 1863, and now has more than 310,000 interments.

Located in the Bronx, N.Y., the non-sectarian cemetery is meticulously maintained, and has absolutely gorgeous mature trees (there are walking tours available), and of course impressive funerary art in its memorials, tombs, monuments and markers.

In 2011 it was designated a National Historic Landmark.

The Titanic Memorial, which, though hard to believe, was commissioned well before the famous movie with a scene that looks suspiciously like this memorial. There are 12 victims of the Titanic buried in Woodlawn.

The vom Saal bench, at the sight of family members on my mother’s side.

Doug and I were in the area for a rugby game, and spent a couple of hours walking around the cemetery before the game.

Suddenly, I was struck by a thought. “Do I have family buried here?” After a series of texts with my mother, who was helpfully able to send a marked map, we located my beloved maternal grandparents! I was thrilled to be able to pay a visit.

Doug and I had attended memorial services for both grandparents after they passed, but we did not attend the final burials at Woodlawn, so I hadn’t put it together that their graves were in this cemetery.

We also found the sites of my great-grandparents, whom I had known as a young child, along with a number of other relatives in “Brewer’s Row,” a stretch of plots occupied by members of some of New York’s most illustrious breweries. My family line is connected to Frederic & Maximilian Schaefer, founders of the Schaefer Brewing Company, but I think that Doug was more excited to visit their memorial than I was.