A good example of the popular draped obelisk, this one very sensibly including a carved cord to keep the carved drapery in place.
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Michel Obelisk, Union Dale Cemetery
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John Mendel Monument, Union Dale Cemetery
An ordinary stone, but with an interesting German epitaph. Unfortunately the last two lines are buried in the ground, and Father Pitt was unwilling to dig for them.
Ja du hast jetzt überstanden
Manche schwere harte Stunden,
Manchen Tag und manche Nacht
Hast du in Schmerzen zugebracht.Standhaft hast du sie ertragen
Deine Schmerzen, deine Plagen…Old Pa Pitt’s German is sketchy at best, but this is how he translates it:
Yes, now thou hast withstood
many heavy, hard hours;
many a day and many a night
hast thou spent in pain.Steadfast hast thou borne it,
thy pain, thy plague…This appears to be one of those circulating funerary poems of the nineteenth century that were like Facebook memes today: they keep showing up on monuments in slightly different wording, and nobody knows where they came from.
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Nusser Monument, South Side Cemetery
In memory of Christian (so we interpret “CHRIST.”) Nusser and his wife Barbara. Barbara’s inscription is clearly later and by a different hand, so we conclude that this monument was probably put up shortly after Christian’s death in 1874.
The Benz monument in St. Michael’s Cemetery is identical, but without the pinnacle; perhaps the top was a separate piece.
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Vallowe Monument, South Side Cemetery
A recording angel sits on a tall shaft, writing in the Book of Life. The dates are in English, but the base of the monument bears an inscription from the Luther Bible: “Sondern wir glauben, durch die Gnade des Herrn Jesu Christi selig zu werden” (“But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved,” Acts 15:11).
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Obelisk Trio, Calvary Cemetery
KONICA MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA Three obelisks bearing three different names, but completely identical and all in a row. Father Pitt knows of no other trio of identical obelisks in Pittsburgh.
