Lowell Cemetery (Lowell, Massachusetts)

Description and history

The cemetery is located in the central eastern part of the city, roughly bounded on the north by Fort Hill Park, on the east by Shedd Park, on the south by railroad tracks, and on the west by the Concord River, from which it is separated by Lawrence Street, where its historic main gate is located. It occupies 84 acres of rolling terrain, much of which has been developed. The main gate is a monumental granite structure designed by C. W. Painter and built in 1862. There is a secondary gate on Knapp Avenue at the cemetery's northeast corner, which was added in 1905. There are two buildings in the cemetery: the Talbot Memorial Chapel (1885) and the Superintendent's Office (1887), both Gothic Revival structures designed by Boston architect Frederick Stickney.

Roadways in the cemetery were laid out to take advantage of the natural terrain, occasionally providing vistas. The main circulation route, Washington Avenue, roughly encircles the property, with several roads providing access across the central areas. The cemetery was laid out in 1841 to a design by George P. Worcester, a civil engineer, applying principles of the rural cemetery movement that was then just coming into vogue. The cemetery has a wide variety of funerary art in diverse styles, from typical Victorian forms to the Egyptian Revival and Art Deco. Many prominent Lowell residents of the 19th and 20th centuries are interred here.

Notable burials

• [[File:Baker Markham Lowell Cemetery.jpg|thumb|Baker Bradt Memorial (1884) Resting place of Joseph Baker and his wife Mary Markham. ]]Henry Livermore Abbott – Brevet Brigadier General in the Union Army during the American Civil War
• Charles Herbert Allen – Congressman; First US civilian governor of Puerto Rico
• Frederick Ayer – Industrialist; co-founder of the American Woolen Company
• James Cook Ayer – patent medicine tycoon
• Benjamin Dean – Congressman
• James B. Francis – chief engineer of Proprietors of Locks and Canals
• Frederic T. Greenhalge – Congressman and Governor of Massachusetts
• Chauncey Langdon Knapp – Congressman
• John Locke – Congressman
• John C. McFarland – Medal of Honor recipient
• John Jacob Rogers – Congressman
• Edith Nourse Rogers – Congressman
• Augustin Thompson – inventor of Moxie
• Paul Tsongas – United States Senator
• Tappan Wentworth – Congressman

Gallery

File:The Ayer Lion Monument, Lowell Cemetery, Lowell, MA (August 2019).jpg|Ayer Lion Monument to James Cook Ayer (1880), Albert Bruce-Joy, sculptor. File:Storey Memorial by Evelyn Longman, Lowell Cemetery, Lowell, MA - March 2016.JPG|Storey Memorial (1905), Evelyn Beatrice Longman, sculptor. File:Mill Girl Monument to Louisa Maria Wells by Evelyn Longman, Lowell Cemetery, Lowell, MA - March 2016.JPG|Mill Girl Monument to Louisa Maria Wells (1906), Evelyn Beatrice Longman, sculptor. File:Seated Woman Monument, Lowell Cemetery, Lowell, MA - March 2016.JPG|Seated Woman Monument (1916), Francis Edwin Elwell, sculptor.

References

References

1. {{NRISref. 2008a
2. "NRHP nomination for Lowell Cemetery". Commonwealth of Massachusetts.