Mount Moriah Cemetery

Introduction

Text-to-speech Audio

Mount Moriah Cemetery in southwest Philadelphia spreads over hundreds of acres, with over 85,000 graves. Opened in 1855 and designed by architect Stephan Decatur Button, the cemetery has been abandoned since 2011, with plant life taking over the monuments. This abandoned cemetery is owned by no one; the last member of its original governing board died over a decade ago. The cemetery spans over two counties, Philadelphia and Delaware. The Department of Veterans Affairs tends to Civil War graves here, and the Friends of Moriah Cemetery group has taken responsibility for cleaning up the cemetery, making more than half of the grounds safe and accessible to the public.

Images

View of Philadelphia Skyline from Mount Moriah Cemetery, 2013, by Smallbones on Wikipedia Commons (CC0)

Land lot, Headstone, Cemetery, Tower block

Backstory and Context

Text-to-speech Audio

From Mount Moriah's opening in 1855, it was a prestigious 54-acre burial ground where prominent Philadelphians were buried, much like the Laurel Hill cemetery. It grew over time to at least 200 acres, with some estimates as high as 380 acres. The cemetery features grand mausoleums, statues, and obelisks. For a time, Betsy Ross was interred here, until her remains were moved in 1976 to the Betsy Ross house. Sources differ on the number of people buried at Mount Moriah, ranging from 85,000 to 150,000 individuals.

The cemetery spans the border of two towns in two counties: Philadelphia in Philadelphia County and Yeadon in Delaware County. This fact has made administration of the cemetery more bureaucratically difficult and has possibly contributed to its decline. It also became too large to maintain, and the cemetery faltered in the last decades of the twentieth century. Nature began reclaiming the space, with vines and undergrowth absorbing the monuments, with the exception of the Civil War burial plots maintained by the Department of Veterans' Affairs.

The last member of the cemetery's board passed away in 2004, leaving the cemetery as a space owned and maintained by no governing body. The cemetery officially closed in 2011, nearly bankrupt. Friends of Mount Moriah Cemetery has taken up maintenance of the grounds, clearing paths and dealing with problems like illegal dumping and wild dogs in an effort to make it an enjoyable green space for the community. About half of the cemetery is now safe and accessible for the public. The Friends group also leads tours, helps people find the graves of relatives, and works to honor sales of burial plots which took place before its closure.

Sources

Spencer, Luke J. Mount Moriah Cemetery, Atlas Obscura. Accessed December 19, 2020. https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/mount-moriah-cemetery

Meier, Alison. The Cemetery Owned by No One" Philadelphia's Mount Moriah, Atlas Obscura. September 30, 2014. Accessed December 19, 2020. https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/the-cemetery-owned-by-no-one-philadelphias-abandoned-mount-moriah

Murrell, David. What Happens When a Cemetery Dies?, Philadelphia Magazine. July 30th 2016. Accessed December 20th 2020. https://www.phillymag.com/news/2016/07/30/mount-moriah-cemetery-friends/.

Image Sources(Click to expand)

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mt_Moriah_view_of_Philly.JPG