Forest Lawn Cemetery (Buffalo, New York)

Forest Lawn Cemetery
Interactive map of Forest Lawn Cemetery
Details
Established1849 (1849)
Location
1411 Delaware Avenue, Buffalo, New York 14209
CountryUnited States
Coordinates42°55′51″N 78°51′39″W / 42.93083°N 78.86083°W / 42.93083; -78.86083
TypePublic
Owned byForest Lawn Group
Size269 acres (1.1 km2)
No. of graves165,000
WebsiteForest Lawn.com
Find a GraveForest Lawn Cemetery
Forest Lawn Cemetery
Location1411 Delaware Avenue, Buffalo, New York 14209
ArchitectClarke, Charles E.; Earnshaw, Joseph
NRHP reference No.90000688[1]
Added to NRHPMay 10, 1990

Forest Lawn Cemetery is a historic rural cemetery in Buffalo, New York, founded in 1849 by Charles E. Clarke. It covers over 269 acres (1.1 km2) and over 165,000 are buried there, including U.S. President Millard Fillmore, First Lady Abigail Fillmore, singer Rick James, Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm, and inventors Lawrence Dale Bell and Willis Carrier. Forest Lawn is on the National Register of Historic Places.

Overview

Forest Lawn Cemetery is a historic rural cemetery located at 1411 Delaware Avenue in Buffalo, New York. Founded in 1849 by Charles E. Clarke, the cemetery encompasses approximately 269 acres (1.1 km²) and serves as both a historic landscape and an active cemetery providing burial, cremation, and memorial services to the Buffalo community.

In addition to its historic monuments, sculptures, and arboretum landscape, Forest Lawn remains an operating cemetery offering traditional burial, mausoleum entombment, cremation services, and columbarium niches. The cemetery contains numerous historic family mausoleums as well as modern community mausoleums available for purchase.

Forest Lawn also operates a crematory and serves as a cultural and educational resource for the region, offering historical tours, genealogy research, and interpretive programming.

Architecture and Landscape

Forest Lawn Cemetery was designed in the tradition of the nineteenth-century rural cemetery movement, combining landscaped grounds, winding roads, and monumental sculpture. The cemetery contains hundreds of examples of funerary art including obelisks, classical monuments, bronze sculpture, stained glass memorials, and architecturally significant mausoleums.

The landscape also functions as an ArbNet Level I Arboretum with a large collection of mature trees and ornamental plantings.

Active Cemetery and Memorial Services

Forest Lawn Cemetery continues to operate as an active cemetery serving the Buffalo region. In addition to traditional in-ground burial, the cemetery offers mausoleum entombment, cremation services, and columbarium niches for cremated remains.

Forest Lawn maintains a number of community mausoleums, which provide above-ground entombment in climate-controlled buildings designed for year-round visitation. These structures complement the many historic private family mausoleums located throughout the cemetery grounds.

The cemetery also operates an on-site crematory and provides a variety of memorialization options including traditional monuments, private family estates, and cremation memorials.

Forest Lawn Cemetery Group

Forest Lawn Cemetery is the flagship property of the Forest Lawn Group, a nonprofit organization that operates a network of historic cemeteries throughout Western New York.

In addition to Forest Lawn Cemetery in Buffalo, the organization maintains and operates fourteen cemeteries across Erie, Wyoming, and Cattaraugus counties, preserving historic burial grounds while continuing to provide active burial and cremation services for local communities.

Among the cemeteries in the Forest Lawn Group are:

  • Clarence Fillmore Cemetery – founded in 1864 on land donated by Rev. Dr. Glezen Fillmore, a cousin of President Millard Fillmore and an early Methodist leader in Western New York. The cemetery contains approximately 8,800 burials, including veterans of the American Revolutionary War.
  • Evergreen Lawn Cemetery – established in 1893 as Bloomingdale Cemetery and located in the Town of Newstead.
  • Forest Hill Cemetery, dedicated in 1870.
  • Freedom Cemetery and Freedom Rural Cemetery, which originated with Welsh Baptist settlers in the 1840s.
  • Gethsemane Cemetery, formerly a private burial ground of the Sisters of St. Francis before being entrusted to the Forest Lawn Group in 2018.
  • Griffins Mills Cemetery, founded in 1834.
  • Lakeside Cemetery, a 200-acre historic cemetery in the Southtowns.
  • Lancaster Rural Cemetery, one of the oldest cemeteries in Lancaster.
  • Oakwood Cemetery, founded in 1841.
  • Quaker Settlement Cemetery, with graves dating to the early nineteenth century.
  • St. Matthew’s Cemetery, a landscaped garden cemetery along Cayuga Creek.
  • Williamsville Cemetery, a historic village cemetery whose earliest burials date to the early nineteenth century.

Together these cemeteries preserve thousands of historic graves and monuments while continuing to operate as active burial grounds for residents of Western New York.

Green Burial

The Forest Lawn Group is also committed to environmentally sustainable burial options. Green burials, which minimize environmental impact by using biodegradable caskets or shrouds and avoiding concrete vaults, are available at select locations.

  • Forest Hill Cemetery in Attica and Lakeside Cemetery in Hamburg both offer dedicated green burial areas, allowing families to choose a natural burial while maintaining the dignity and care of the cemetery grounds.

By offering these modern and eco-conscious options, the Forest Lawn Group continues to meet contemporary needs while preserving the historic character and natural beauty of its cemeteries.

Mausoleums

Forest Lawn Cemetery contains numerous private family mausoleums dating from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, reflecting Buffalo’s industrial and architectural history.

In addition to historic mausoleums, the cemetery maintains several community mausoleums that continue to provide entombment space for families today.

One of the most notable structures is the Blue Sky Mausoleum, designed in 1928 by architect Frank Lloyd Wright for Darwin D. Martin and constructed in 2004. The monument contains 24 crypts and is considered one of the few Wright-designed funerary monuments in existence.

Other mausoleums in the cemetery include:

  • Burgess-Little Mausoleum – designed by H. H. (Henry Harrison) Little.
  • Butler Mausoleum – constructed for Edward H. Butler, proprietor of the Buffalo Evening News.
  • Buswell-Hochstetter Mausoleum
  • Good Mausoleum – constructed for Daniel B. Good, who established the Seibert-Good Company in Chicago, which later consolidated with the Seymour H. Knox stores of Buffalo, N.Y. and finally amalgamated with the F.W. Woolworth Company.
  • Goodyear (Frank) Mausoleum – constructed for Frank Henry Goodyear, who, with his brother, Charles W. Goodyear, started the Buffalo and Susquehanna Railroad.
  • Kellner Mausoleum – constructed for John. S. Kellner, president of the Crystal Ice and Storage Company.
  • Knox Mausoleum – constructed for Seymour H. Knox I, co-founder of F. W. Woolworth Company.
  • Laub Mausoleum
  • Letchworth-Skinner Mausoleum –
  • Mitchel H. Mark Mausoleum – constructed for Mitchell Mark, founder of the Vitascope Theater Company
  • Oberkircher Mausoleum – constructed for Caroline Oberkircher and family.
  • Pierce (George) Mausoleum – constructed for George N. Pierce who co-founded a company known as Heinz, Pierce and Munshauer for the manufacture of refrigerators, birdcages, iceboxes and bathtubs, until leaving to establish the Pierce Cycle Company, which later became the Pierce-Arrow Motor Car Co.
  • Stachura Mausoleum – constructed for Chester and Gloria Stachura.
  • Steuernagel Mausoleum – constructed for John Steuernagel, president and board chairman of Kleinhans department store.
  • Vars Mausoleum – designed by Lawrence Bley and Duane Lyman. Interred are Harry Thorp Vars, Gertrude Waltho Vars, Mary G. Vars, Addison Foster Vars, Addison F. Vars Jr., Aline Vars, Carlton J. Balliett, Evelyn Waltho Balliett Jr., Rose Waltho Brown, Bertha W. Barker, and Estelle Noell Reavis.
  • Walden-Myer Mausoleum – designed by Richard A. Waite for Buffalo's mayor from 1838–39,[2] Ebenezer Walden, and son-in law, Albert J. Myer, recognized by many as the "founder and father" of the US Weather Bureau.[3]
  • Willams-Pratt Mausoleum

Community Mausoleums

In addition to its historic private mausoleums, Forest Lawn Cemetery maintains several modern community mausoleums that provide above-ground entombment for individuals and families.[4]

These structures include the Birchwood Mausoleum, Oakwood Mausoleum, Rosewood Mausoleum, and Serenity Mausoleum, which offer climate-controlled crypts and indoor visitation areas. Community mausoleums provide an alternative to traditional burial and have become an increasingly common form of memorialization in the United States.

Construction has also begun on the Legacy Mausoleum, a new memorial structure designed to expand above-ground entombment options at Forest Lawn.

Margaret L. Wendt Archive and Research Center

In 2014, the 3,140-square-foot (292 m2)[5] Margaret L. Wendt Archive and Resource Center opened within the cemetery. It is a digitized history center, of interment records maintained since 1849,[5] that features a number of interpretive displays highlighting the notable citizens buried in the cemetery. The building features climate controlled rooms and the design of the building mimics some of the historic structure that once stood at the same site.[6] Construction and funding for the Center was provided by The Margaret L. Wendt Foundation along with support from The John R. Oishei Foundation.[5]

Others buried here

See also

References

  1. ^ "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. July 9, 2010.
  2. ^ Rizzo, Michael. "Through the Mayor's Eyes: Ebenezer Walden". The Buffalonian. Archived from the original on May 17, 2008. Retrieved June 14, 2019.
  3. ^ "General Albert J. Myer (1829–1880)". National Weather Service, Buffalo. Archived from the original on March 8, 2009. Retrieved December 8, 2008.
  4. ^ "Welcome to Forest Lawn Cemetery & Crematory - Buffalo, NY". Forest Lawn. Retrieved March 5, 2026.
  5. ^ a b c Nussbaumer, Newell (November 19, 2013). "Forest Lawn's Margaret L. Wendt Archive & Resource Center". Buffalo Rising. Archived from the original on June 2, 2016. Retrieved February 16, 2016.
  6. ^ Nussbaumer, Newell (September 20, 2014). "The Margaret L. Wendt Archive and Resource Center". Buffalo Rising. Archived from the original on April 16, 2016. Retrieved February 16, 2016.
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h i "Roll of Honor". The Buffalo Commercial. May 31, 1900. p. 8. Retrieved June 14, 2019.
  8. ^ "Dr. Willis H. Carrier, 'Father of Air Conditioning'". Buffalo Evening News. October 9, 1950. p. 32. Retrieved February 28, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
  9. ^ "Death Notice, John W. Cudmore, M.D." The Buffalo News. Buffalo, New York. March 5, 2023. p. C4 – via Newspapers.com.
  10. ^ Anderson, Dale (September 28, 2023). "Dr. John W. Cudmore, 84, surgeon, major general in National Guard". The Buffalo News. Buffalo, New York. p. B5 – via Newspapers.com.
  11. ^ Maine League of Historical Societies and Museums (1970). Isaacson, Doris A. (ed.). Maine: A Guide 'Down East'. Rockland, Maine: Courier-Gazette, Inc. pp. 260–261.
  12. ^ "Funeral of Dr. Mann". Buffalo Courier Express. March 5, 1921. p. 7. Retrieved August 28, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
  13. ^ Mr. Spaulding and Greenback Resumption (1875, October 16). In The Commercial and Financial Chronicle (Vol. XXI, p. 358). New York: William B. Dana.
  14. ^ "Judge Wheeler Succumbs Here in 84th Year". Buffalo Evening News. November 21, 1935. p. 1. Retrieved August 21, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
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