Spring Grove Cemetery
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Spring Grove Cemetery and Arboretum (733 acres) is a notable, nonprofit garden cemetery and arboretum located at 4521 Spring Grove Avenue, Cincinnati, Ohio. It is open daily.
The cemetery dates from 1844, when members of the Cincinnati Horticultural Society formed a cemetery association. They took their inspiration from contemporary rural cemeteries such as Père Lachaise in Paris, and Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts. On December 1, 1844 Salmon P. Chase and others prepared the Articles of Incorporation. The cemetery was formally chartered on January 21, 1845, and the first burial took place on September 1, 1845. In 1987, the association officially changed its name to "Spring Grove Cemetery and Arboretum" to better represent its remarkable collection of both native and exotic trees, as well as its State and National Champion Trees.
Spring Grove encompasses 733 acres of which 400 acres are currently landscaped and maintained. Its grounds include 12 ponds, many fine tombstones and memorials, and various examples of Gothic Revival architecture. As of 2005, its National Champion trees were Cladrastis kentukea and Halesia diptera; its State Champion trees included Abies cilicica, Abies koreana, Cedrus libani, Chionanthus virginicus, Eucommia ulmoides, Halesia parvifolia, Metasequoia glyptostroboides, Phellodendron amurense, Picea orientalis, Picea polita, Pinus flexilis, Pinus griffithi, Pinus monticola, Quercus cerris, Quercus nigra, Taxodium distichum, Ulmus serotina, and Zelkova serrata.
[edit] Notable graves
- Salmon P. Chase, Chief Justice of the United States
- Levi Coffin, Quaker abolitionist
- Alphonso Taft, father of William Howard Taft
- William Cooper Procter and James Norris Gamble, founders of Procter & Gamble
- Bernard Kroger, founder of Kroger supermarkets
- Charles L. Fleischmann, yeast manufacturer
- John Morgan Walden, Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church
- Theodore Sommers Henderson, Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church
- Jacob Ammen, Civil War general
- Godfrey Weitzel, Civil War general
- Alexander Long, US House of Representatives (1863-1865)
- Samuel Fenton Cary, congressman, prohibitionist