Deadsville, man
Should auld acquaintance be forgot? That’s the question posed, albeit indirectly, by a New York Times story about a Bay Area town that’s really dead at night:
COLMA,
With
Where did all the land go? To feed the major local growth industry: human burial grounds.
Such is Colma, Calif., land of the dead for three-quarters of a century, and becoming more so all the time.
“We have 1,500 aboveground residents,” Mayor Helen Fisicaro said, “and 1.5 million underground.”
Humans have always buried and revered their dead. Reverence for the departed dates back as far as humans have lived in settlements; it’s one of our defining traits.
The caption reads:
“Archeologists treat human burials, respectfully, typically reburying remains if descendants are found and request it.”
In the same vein, every town or village has had its burial yard, perhaps next to the church, near the town green, or — here — just a bit south of the growing town:
Colma was founded as a necropolis by cemetery operators in 1924, to protect graveyards from capricious acts of government. The businesses of many of those operators had been disrupted a decade earlier when the city of San Francisco, 10 miles to the north, evicted all but a couple of the 26 cemeteries there, along with the thousands of bodies they held.
The living encroaching on the dead is a common pattern of expanding cities. Relocation of crypts and mortuaries has been a feature of
Native American burial
As time fades the departed’s memory, there always arise good reasons for moving the bones, both ostensible and ulterior:
The city’s politicians had argued that cemeteries spread disease, but the true reason for the eviction was the rising value of real estate, said San Francisco’s archivist emeritus, Gladys Hansen.
In purely economic terms, cemeteries are a low-use low-value way to deploy property. Our view of them has changed as humanity has civilized, life spans have lengthened, and death has become less familiar:
“Most Americans used to live near a graveyard in the 18th century,” said David C. Sloane, author of The Last Great Necessity: Cemeteries in American History. “That changed in the 19th century, when big cemeteries were on the edge of the cities and became destinations,” the precursors to civic parks. By the 20th century, Dr. Sloane said, an aversion to dealing with death had made cemeteries places that people “went out of their way not to go to.”
Sloane went out of his way not to make dead jokes.
With urbanization, consolidation comes to the last resting place:
Still, 73% of Colma’s 2.2 square miles is zoned for cemeteries — or “memorial parks,” as the operators call them. There are 17 such parks, including those that cater to Italians, Jews, Greek Orthodox, Japanese and Serbs.
Here, hearses far outnumber hot rods. Colma’s museum has a cemetery room, of course. Instead of the metal signs that customarily mark boundaries between towns, new ones made of somber granite have been ordered by town officials.
Naturally, some make a living off the inevitability of death:
Colma’s motto is “It’s Great to Be Alive in Colma!” And residents say they are comfortable being alive among the mausoleums, the marble obelisks and the tombstones. They express appreciation for the tranquility of their hometown, where a serene, occasionally whimsical attitude toward death prevails.
Wyatt Earp, brave, courageous and bold
In the way New Jersey students know that Thomas Edison’s laboratory is in West Orange, the people of Colma know that Wyatt Earp’s ashes are buried at Hills of Eternity, a Jewish cemetery (he wasn’t; his wife was), and that Joe DiMaggio is at Holy Cross Cemetery, where visitors often lean bats against his gravestone.
Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio?
A nation turns its lonely eyes to you
Woo woo woo
As urbanization has raised land values in other towns, pushing out their cemeteries, it has ironically made the few remaining cemetery expansion prospects more valuable too:
Dr. Sloane, an associate professor at the University of Southern California, says there is a growing demand for space at American cemeteries that is fueled in large part by immigrant families who insist on elaborate burials as a way to help establish their identity in a community. In Colma, so little undeveloped property remains that an acre sells for more than $2 million.
Eventually, economic pressure also changes public attitudes, with higher density coming even to cemeteries. Crypts and mausoleums pack more memories per square foot and flourish in urban locales.
The cemeteries have two choices, said Steve Doukas, general manager of
“As expensive as it is to live in the Bay Area,” Mr. Doukas said, “it’s also expensive to be buried here.”
Colma was founded in 1924 as a necropolis, and has never failed in its intended purpose.
Above, the Greek Orthodox cemetery there. (New York Times)
However much we wish to remember our forebears, eventually the prices will become too high, and the move will be to cremation.
“Cemeteries,” he said, “are really for the living.”
So are towns.
“Over-ture! Cur-tain lights! This is it! We’ll hit the heights!”
