Pittsburgh Cemeteries

Tag: Family Plots

  • Frauenheim Family Plot, St. Mary’s Cemetery

    Frauenheim family plot

    Though old Pa Pitt tends to focus on individual monuments, there is an art to arranging a family plot. This one is arranged very artistically. Everything is made from the same stone, which is dark now, although that may be the result of a century and a half of heavy industry. A large Gothic monument dominates it in the rear, so that the family has no trouble finding the plot. Stone steps—superfluous from a practical point of view now, but there was probably a stone fence around the plot before the groundskeepers had their way—lead us up into the sacred precinct. There the Frauenheims lie in a row in their own matched beds. The earliest burial here seems to be Edward Frauenheim, who died in 1891, and that may be a good guess for the date of the main monument.

  • Philips Plot, Peters Creek Baptist Church Cemetery

    This plot includes the tombstone of the Rev. David Philips, minister and Revolutionary War captain; clearly it belongs to a family of some influence, and it is still kept separate from the rest of the cemetery by a metal railing of comparatively recent vintage (which is to say within the past century).

  • Carnahan Monument, Mount Lebanon Cemetery

    The Carnahan family has been prominent in the near South Hills for a long time, and this plot, with its chunky rusticated monument, is lovingly maintained with a garden of ornamental grasses.

  • Reich Plot, South Side Cemetery

    The only legible stone in this well-maintained plot belongs to Conrad Reich, who died in 1896. A damaged stone next to his is probably for his wife Gertrude, who died in 1910. They had children who are buried in this cemetery, but the ones old Pa Pitt could trace were buried in other plots. So it seems that Mr. and Mrs. Reich have quite a bit of room in here to stretch their legs.

  • Trautman Plot, South Side Cemetery

    This plot bears the name “Trautman” on the threshold, but there are no memorials of any kind inside it. Old Pa Pitt wonders whether any Trautmans are actually buried here; sometimes a plot is bought and then left empty when the buyer moves elsewhere. At any rate, there is something admirable about the defiant squareness of this plot in a landscape that does not reward rectilinear thinking.