02-10-14 Council Agenda & Packet

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United States Department of the Interior National Park Service / National Register of Historic Places Registration Form NPS Form 10 -900. OMB No. 1024 -0016 South Bend City Cemetery St. Joseph, Indiana Name of Property County and State disrepair due to deferred maintenance, benign neglect, vandalism, and poor practices by contract workers and landscapers. Burial sites sit among some 75 mature growth trees, shrubs and other native herbaceous material. Municipal Cemetery One of the earliest documents showing the cemetery is a Bird's Eye View of South Bend from 1866, which shows the cemetery as confined to the small and largely open original area. Very typical of mid - nineteenth century municipal cemeteries and likely directed by engineers, the early design took on a regular, gridded pattern. In doing so, little room was designated for landscaping, as to maximize the useable land. The concentration of burials is the most compact here, and the stones are the most worn. What few paths there are, save the main northbound road within the cemetery, are gravel or grass and not well defined. It is obvious that this portion in particular was designed with only the foot traffic of a funeral procession in mind. The largest additions to the original four acre site were made in 1868 and 1899, a relatively short period of expansion and change. In 1911, a St. Joseph County Atlas shows the cemetery taking up the entire area it occupies today. At this point, Linden Avenue, which originally ran through the cemetery, is shown ending where the original entrance had once been. Lawn Cemetery Movement As the site of City Cemetery evolved, it was influenced by various stylistic patterns of design. Most significant of these was the Lawn Park Movement, influential in the United States in the early decades of the 201h century. The Lawn Park Movement promotes a sense of openness, created by sweeps of lawn and monuments that are less dense. Unlike the structured municipal graveyards, this movement promoted cemeteries not only as places of mourning, but also as places to enjoy nature. Begun as a municipal cemetery, the later expansions display the landscaping of the lawn movement more characteristic of rural cemeteries. It is in the southwest addition to City Cemetery that curvilinear lines take precedence over linear, allowing for changing vistas amid a relatively flat landscape. The design modifications are all strongly suggestive of formal architectural involvement. While the designer remains unknown, influences stem from the lawn movement. In alignment with the design ideals of this movement, later additions to City Cemetery give a sense of an open lawn with less dense placement of smaller monuments and landscaping than in previous sections. Present Condition The main entrance, located at the terminus of a brick street, North Elm, is marked by a large cast iron Late Victorian style gate. The paving brick, date unknown, is set at a 45 degree angle to the concrete curb and is 24 feet in width. This brick paving extends into the cemetery grounds about 25 feet. The Sexton's Cottage is located just inside the gate to the east with a maintenance building behind farther east. A paved path running north from the gate, once known as First Principal Avenue, passes through the original plat of the cemetery. An 1875 St. Joseph County atlas shows City Cemetery confined to the relative small formally planned area in the southeast corner of the tract. The plan reveals l" 2 "d and 3` Avenues running north to south, bisected by an unnamed east to west road. Linden Avenue is shown running east to west through the tract, Section 7 page 6