CALVARY
CEMETERY
(Chicago Tribune, March 25,
1900)
Calvary Cemetery, whose gates are soon to be closed, is a veritable city of the dead. The bodies of more than 100,000 people are housed in its silent walls of clay. Calvary Cemetery was established in 1859. Not only have nearly all of the distinguished dead of the Catholic faith who have died since then been buried there, but the remains of the greater number of those who had been buried in the older and now abandoned cemeteries have been removed there. In addition the greater number of the prominent Catholics now living in Chicago have burial lots there awaiting them.
The
shifting to it of the ashes of the dead has brought Calvary Cemetery near
to the beginning of the history of Chicago. Immediately prior to 1859,
and for nearly 20 years before that time, the Catholic burial was on the
lakeshore just south of Lincoln Park. Some of the finest residences of
the Lake Shore Drive are now stand on its site. Not only were the remains
from this cemetery taken to Calvary, but the bones of those who were buried
around old St. Mary's church were removed there. The roster of the dead
there is not complete because all of the records of the cemetery were destroyed
in 1871 by the great fire. Many of the victims of the great fire are buried
there.
To
tell the lives of all of those who are buried there would be to tell the
history of Chicago. The first of Chicago's dead were Catholics. Mrs. O'Leary
is buried there.