American Afterlife

American Afterlife PDF Author: Kate Sweeney
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
ISBN: 0820346896
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 232

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Book Description
An award-winning writer explores the patchwork American cultural history of grieving the departed. One family inters their matriarch’s ashes on the floor of the ocean. Another holds a memorial weenie roast each year at a green-burial cemetery. An 1898 ad for embalming fluid promises, “You can make mummies with it!” while a leading contemporary burial vault is touted as impervious to the elements. A grieving mother, 150 years ago, might spend her days tending a garden at her daughter’s grave. Today, she might tend the roadside memorial she erected where her daughter was killed. One mother wears a locket containing her daughter’s hair; the other, a necklace containing her ashes. What happens after someone dies depends on our personal stories and on where those stories fall in a larger tale―that of death in America. It’s a powerful tale that we usually keep hidden from our everyday lives until we have to face it. American Afterlife by Kate Sweeney reveals this world through a collective portrait of Americans past and present who are personally involved with death: obit writers in the desert, an Atlantic funeral voyage, a fourth-generation funeral director―even a midwestern museum that shows us our death-obsessed Victorian progenitors. Each story illuminates details in another, revealing a landscape that feels at once strange and familiar, one that’s by turns odd, tragic, poignant, and sometimes even funny. “Sweeney’s quest for the “why” behind mourning rituals has given us a book in the best tradition of narrative journalism.”—Jessica Handler, author of Braving the Fire: A Guide to Writing about Grief and Loss

American Afterlife

American Afterlife PDF Author: Kate Sweeney
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
ISBN: 0820346896
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 232

Get Book Here

Book Description
An award-winning writer explores the patchwork American cultural history of grieving the departed. One family inters their matriarch’s ashes on the floor of the ocean. Another holds a memorial weenie roast each year at a green-burial cemetery. An 1898 ad for embalming fluid promises, “You can make mummies with it!” while a leading contemporary burial vault is touted as impervious to the elements. A grieving mother, 150 years ago, might spend her days tending a garden at her daughter’s grave. Today, she might tend the roadside memorial she erected where her daughter was killed. One mother wears a locket containing her daughter’s hair; the other, a necklace containing her ashes. What happens after someone dies depends on our personal stories and on where those stories fall in a larger tale―that of death in America. It’s a powerful tale that we usually keep hidden from our everyday lives until we have to face it. American Afterlife by Kate Sweeney reveals this world through a collective portrait of Americans past and present who are personally involved with death: obit writers in the desert, an Atlantic funeral voyage, a fourth-generation funeral director―even a midwestern museum that shows us our death-obsessed Victorian progenitors. Each story illuminates details in another, revealing a landscape that feels at once strange and familiar, one that’s by turns odd, tragic, poignant, and sometimes even funny. “Sweeney’s quest for the “why” behind mourning rituals has given us a book in the best tradition of narrative journalism.”—Jessica Handler, author of Braving the Fire: A Guide to Writing about Grief and Loss

Near the Exit

Near the Exit PDF Author: Lori Erickson
Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press
ISBN: 1611649552
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 180

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Book Description
"An ideal guidebook to facing the inevitable." Foreword Reviews After her brother died unexpectedly and her mother moved into a dementia-care facility, spiritual travel writer and Episcopal deacon Lori Erickson felt called to a new quest: to face death head on, with the eye of a tourist and the heart of a pastor. Blending memoir, spirituality, and travel, Near the Exit examines how cultures confront and have confronted death, from Egypt's Valley of the Kings and Mayan temples, to a Colorado cremation pyre and Day of the Dead celebrations, to Maori settlements and tourist-destination graveyards. Erickson reflects on mortalityâ€"the ways we avoid it, the ways we cope with it, and the ways life is made more precious by accepting itâ€"in places as far away as New Zealand and as close as the nursing home up the street. Throughout her personal journey and her travels, Erickson  helps us to see that one of the most life-affirming things we can do is to invite death along for the ride.

199 Cemeteries to See Before You Die

199 Cemeteries to See Before You Die PDF Author: Loren Rhoads
Publisher: Black Dog & Leventhal
ISBN: 0316473790
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 425

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Book Description
A hauntingly beautiful travel guide to the world's most visited cemeteries, told through spectacular photography andtheir unique histories and residents. More than 3.5 million tourists flock to Paris's Pè Lachaise cemetery each year.They are lured there, and to many cemeteries around the world, by a combination of natural beauty, ornate tombstones and crypts, notable residents, vivid history, and even wildlife. Many also visit Mount Koya cemetery in Japan, where 10,000 lanterns illuminate the forest setting, or graveside in Oaxaca, Mexico to witness Day of the Dead fiestas. Savannah's Bonaventure Cemetery has gorgeous night tours of the Southern Gothic tombstones under moss-covered trees that is one of the most popular draws of the city. 199 Cemeteries to See Before You Die features these unforgettable cemeteries, along with 196 more, seen in more than 300 photographs. In this bucket list of travel musts, author Loren Rhoads, who hosts the popular Cemetery Travel blog, details the history and features that make each destination unique. Throughout will be profiles of famous people buried there, striking memorials by noted artists, and unusual elements, such as the hand carved wood grave markers in the Merry Cemetery in Romania.

Hidden History of Old Atlanta

Hidden History of Old Atlanta PDF Author: Mark Pifer
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 1439671982
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 208

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Book Description
Old Atlanta may conjure images of southern belles and Civil War ruination, but the full story stretches back millennia, even before the first known residents arrived five thousand years ago. From centuries of Native American settlements that ended with the removal of the Creeks to the rough-and-ready pioneer days, the area was rich in history long before it was called Atlanta. Author Mark Pifer unfolds a complex saga, including forgotten details from the struggles of African Americans and new immigrants, while noting modern locations bursting with tales that predate the City in the Forest's rise amid the treetops.

Traces in the Dust

Traces in the Dust PDF Author: Melvin LeRoy Green Macklin
Publisher: Turner Publishing Company
ISBN: 1681622165
Category : Reference
Languages : en
Pages : 533

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Book Description
(From the Preface) Traces in the Dust focuses upon the African American families and residents of Carbondale since the founding of the Carbondale Township (1852). It is meant to provide a glimpse of the growth, progress, and development of the Black American community in the city through the exploration of recorded data and oral history.

Atlanta's Oakland Cemetery

Atlanta's Oakland Cemetery PDF Author: Ren Davis
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
ISBN: 0820343137
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 252

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Book Description
Through engaging narrative, rich photography, archival images and detailed maps, a versatile guide to Atlanta's oldest public cemetery is a great way to tour the cemetery's landscape of remembrance, as well as a unique way to explore Atlanta's history. Original.

Louisiana History

Louisiana History PDF Author: Florence M. Jumonville
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 0313076790
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 810

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Book Description
From the accounts of 18th-century travelers to the interpretations of 21st-century historians, Jumonville lists more than 6,800 books, chapters, articles, theses, dissertations, and government documents that describe the rich history of America's 18th state. Here are references to sources on the Louisiana Purchase, the Battle of New Orleans, Carnival, and Cajuns. Less-explored topics such as the rebellion of 1768, the changing roles of women, and civic development are also covered. It is a sweeping guide to the publications that best illuminate the land, the people, and the multifaceted history of the Pelican State. Arranged according to discipline and time period, chapters cover such topics as the environment, the Civil War and Reconstruction, social and cultural history, the people of Louisiana, local, parish, and sectional histories, and New Orleans. It also lists major historical sites and repositories of primary materials. As the only comprehensive bibliography of the secondary sources about the state, ^ILouisiana History^R is an invaluable resource for scholars and researchers.

Women in Atlanta

Women in Atlanta PDF Author: Staci Catron-Sullivan
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 1439629749
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 148

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Book Description
Although Southern women are often portrayed as belles, the photographic record suggests the true diversity, complexity, and richness of their lives. In their roles as wives, mothers, teachers, pilots, businesswomen, and reformers, among others, women contributed greatly to the growth and development of the region. In Atlanta, they helped remake a small railroad hub into the thriving capital of the New South. The photographs in this book, drawn from the collections of the James G. Kenan Research Center at the Atlanta History Center, depict Atlanta women at work and at play from the mid-19th century to the 1970s. In addition to illustrating womens dramatically changing roles during this period, the volume situates these women within the emerging regional and national contexts of their time.

Historic Oakland Cemetery

Historic Oakland Cemetery PDF Author: Tevi Taliaferro
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 9780738513553
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 128

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Book Description
To learn about a community's past, the city cemetery is the place to visit. As Atlanta's oldest permanent landmark, Oakland Cemetery holds the past, present, and future history of the Gateway to the South. Established in 1850 as a small municipal cemetery on the southeastern edge of town, Historic Oakland has evolved into 88 acres of art, history, architecture, gardens, and peaceful green space in the heart of downtown Atlanta. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1976 as a significant example of an historic Victorian-era cemetery, Oakland is the final resting place of more than 70,000 deceased. People of both statewide and national importance have been buried throughout the cemetery's grounds in the past 150 years, including author Margaret Mitchell, golfing legend Bobby Jones, Confederate generals and soldiers, Georgia governors, Atlanta mayors, and ordinary people known only to their families. Historic Oakland Cemetery explores the history of both the cemetery and the people who were laid to rest there. From the famous to the infamous, the legendary to the ordinary, every person buried in the cemetery has a story to tell. For all of its emphasis on the past, Oakland remains an active cemetery, a public park, and an educational resource in which to study lush landscapes and Georgia history.

The Historic Oakland Cemetery of Atlanta: Speaking Stones

The Historic Oakland Cemetery of Atlanta: Speaking Stones PDF Author: Cathy J. Kaemmerlen
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 1625844204
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 154

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Book Description
Approximately seventy thousand souls lay in rest at historic Oakland Cemetery in Atlanta, Georgia. They are the silent witnesses of what has gone on before. Their stones carry their stories and the history of Atlanta. Cathy Kaemmerlen, renowned storyteller and Georgia author, explores the tales behind many of the cemetery's notable figures, including: " Margaret Mitchell, of Gone with the Wind fame " Bobby Jones, 1930 winner of all four major golf championships " The Rich brothers, founders of Rich's Department Store " Joseph Jacobs, in whose pharmacy the first Coca-Cola was served