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An unusually elaborate stone by a talented local artisan whose talents would soon be rendered irrelevant by the growth of a more centralized monument industry.
IN MEMORY OF
HECTOR
McFADDEN
Who departed
this life Decr 12th
1834 aged 65
years
—
He was just
And honest
And a friend
To the poor.
No Christian could ask for a finer epitaph than that.
The letters are formed very well, but here (as in many other early-settler tombstones) we see that marking out the inscription in advance was not part of the stonecutter’s method. He runs out of space for the name of the deceased, and then again on the next line for the name of the town Canonsburgh (which we no longer spell with an H). He also left out the R in “MEMORY,” and the heading SACRED to the IN MEMOY OF is very decorative but grammatically nonsense.
This transcription preserves the eccentric spelling of the original:
SACRED
to the
IN MEMOY OF
—
ROBERT PATTERSON
Merchant of Canonsburgh
Who departed this life
January 31st A. D. 1833
in the 29th year of his age
—
He was a man of temperance and moral habits
as a man of buissness he was unrivell’d
as a friend he was truly candid and sincere
as a husband and parent [he was] kind & affec[tionate]
Father Pitt took this picture in 1999 with an Argus C3. The Chartiers Hill Cemetery is notable for interesting epitaphs.
HERE SLEEPS IN DEATH
NANCY MARSHALL
Who died July 2nd 1833
aged 40 years
Her equal is gone before her but her superior will never follow as a WIFE MOTHER and FRIEND.
—
My flesh shall slumber in the ground,
Till the last trumpet’s joyful sound,
Then burst the chains with sweet surprise
And in my SAVIOURS image rise.
This epitaph is the last stanza of Isaac Watts’ metrical version of Psalm 17.
Old Pa Pitt took this picture on black-and-white film in 1999 with an Argus C3, which captured a very legible image in spite of strong backlighting.
A particularly fine example of Art Deco as applied to cemetery monuments. It may date from 1931; that seems to be the earliest of several Dreyfuss burials marked by separate stones in front of the monument.
The extra width gives the mausoleum room for more inmates, but it does not seem to have been worked into the design well. It looks as though the Franks and Klees ordered a standard Doric temple, quite correct in its proportions, and then as an afterthought added wings.
The stained glass is very pretty.
A splendid Egyptian mausoleum with a fine view of the Pyramids out the back window.
The West View Cemetery is notable for a number of tasteful modernist mausoleums. On this one, note how the etched decoration is repeated in the bronze doors. The landscaping in front is very unusual, and in fact almost unique in Pittsburgh, where cemetery groundskeepers usually expect to be able to mow right up to the steps of a mausoleum.
An odd mixture of styles: the base is a sort of medieval-classical fantasy, from which sprouts a column with an Egyptian-style lotus capital, and on that stands an allegorical figure of Hope.
Considering that the Exodus is the central event in Israel’s sacred history, Egyptian Revival has always struck old Pa Pitt as an odd choice of styles for a Jewish cemetery. But with this particular mausoleum he can see the appeal. “You think you’re a god-king, Pharaoh? Well, how would you like to be a door handle for the rest of eternity? What do you think of that, Mr. Bricks-Without-Straw?”
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