Past Events

 

 

Memories in Stone: The Geology of Grave Markers of the Grove Street Cemetery – An Online Talk

sunday, november 10, 2024
2 p.m.
online

The Grove Street Cemetery is many things: a site of memory and contemplation, a resource for studying the people and history of New Haven, and an arboretum with notable trees, but above all, it is a collection of geological specimens that were carefully selected and sculpted to mark the graves of local residents and families. A wide variety of sedimentary, igneous, and metamorphic stones are present on the grounds, and the differences in their composition and character offer an opportunity to explore their distinctive qualities. In some cases, the source of the stone can even be traced to regional quarries, which have their own storied pasts.

Join the Friends of the Grove Street Cemetery at 2 pm on Sunday, November 10, for an online talk by geologist Daniel Coburn of Southern Connecticut State University, about the cemetery’s collection of gravestones and family monuments, as well as some of the notable figures in the history of earth science who are buried there.
 
This online program is sponsored by the Friends of the Grove Street Cemetery and the Beinecke Library.

 

 

8 State Tour, Saving America’s Graveyards
Live Stone Carving Demonstration with Christoph Henning

tuesday, may 28, 2024
9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
grove street cemetery, 227 grove street
Christoph Henning is a stonecutter with extensive experience in historic preservation efforts. At the age of 16 he started a formal two year stonecutting and lettercutting apprenticeship at the Travertine Works in Germany. In the past 21 years he has been working independently as Schall & Staub Enterprises — now located in Berlin, Connecticut. Most of his letter cutting has been for cemetery replications, donor plaques, or public and private building signage, and can be found all over New England and in New Haven at several Yale and Yale associated buildings, at Wooster Square, at Trinity on the Green, at Center Church on the Green, and even on the flagpole monument.
 
This is the first event of the 2024 48 State Tour. Every workshop in the series will be unique and have somewhat different content dependent upon the varying preservation needs. Since these events are site specific, the topics discussed will relate to the region where each event is held. A concerted effort will be made to perform as many different types of repairs as possible that represent the most common problems associated with gravestone preservation. 
 
All 48 State Tour events are free and open to the public. For more information: 48statetour.com.
 
This program is presented by 48 State Tour, and cohosted with assistant superintendent of Grove Street Cemetery, Jacob Jennings, and office manager Rose Rodriguez.

 

The Visual Arts at Grove Street Cemetery with Channing Harris

sunday, november 12, 2023
2 p.m.
An exploration of some of the painters, sculptors, architects and others memorialized in the Grove Street Cemetery in New Haven, this illustrated talk will present biographic notes, design of monuments, and the cultural, historical context of National Landmark Grove Street Cemetery.
 
Channing Harris is a volunteer in architectural preservation and cemetery landscapes. A retired senior landscape architect, project manager, and campus planner with 40 years experience in academic and healthcare institutional work, he serves on the boards of the Friends of the Grove Street Cemetery and of the New Haven Preservation Trust.
 
The cemetery is the oldest  the nation designed as a “city of the dead,” with named avenues and cross streets. A National Historic Landmark, it is also the first chartered burial ground in the United States and the first to be arranged in family lots.
 
This online program is sponsored by the Friends of the Grove Street Cemetery and the Beinecke Library.
 
 

Seven Things You (Probably) Didn’t Know About English Cemeteries

sunday, november 6, 2022
4 p.m.

Presented in partnership with the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.

A talk by Dr Ian Dungavell, Chief Executive of the Friends of Highgate Cemetery Trust, in conjunction with the quasquibicentennial of the Grove Street Cemetery in New Haven.

English garden cemeteries have a lot in common with those of the nineteenth-century rural cemetery movement in America. The story of beautifully laid-out grounds ornamented with trees, shrubs and flowers providing a garden of rest distinct from the overcrowded and unsanitary urban graveyard can be told equally of both countries. But, delving a little deeper into the first two decades of cemetery establishment in England, and taking in Manchester, Liverpool, Sheffield, Norwich and London, this lecture will show that the tranquil sepulchral garden was not as quiet as it seemed. Nor is it quiet now: how can we make them sustainable for today?
 
 

Mondays at Beinecke Online: Grove Street Cemetery History featuring Bias and Margaret Stanley

monday, october 17, 2022
4 p.m.

Presented in partnership with the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.

A talk in conjunction with the quasquibicentennial of the Grove Street Cemetery. A neighbor to the library in New Haven, it is the nation’s oldest cemetery organized as a city of the dead. The first burial was on November 7, 1797.
 
This talk will include an introduction to the cemetery’s history by Michael Morand, Director of Community Engagement at the Beinecke and Chair of the Friends of the Grove Street Cemetery, and a presentation by Tarel Dennie, Yale College ’24, on Bias and Margaret Stanley, pillars of 19th century New Haven and leaders in its historic Black community.
 
Talks begin at 4 p.m. followed by conversation and question and answer beginning about 4:30 p.m. until 5:00 p.m.
 
 

Uncovering Their History: African, African American, and Native American Burials in Hartford’s Ancient Burying Ground, 1640–1815

wednesday, september 14, 2022
6 p.m.

Presented in partnership with the New Haven Museum and sponsored by Connecticut Explored.

The New Haven Museum commemorates Connecticut Freedom Trail Month with this virtual presentation by historian, educator, author, and publisher of Connecticut Explored magazine, Dr. Katherine A. Hermes.

Dr. Hermes’ lecture will focus on the “Uncovering Their History” project and the people of color interred in the Ancient Burying Ground in Hartford. A team of experienced researchers joined her to create “Uncovering Their History,” a resource devoted to the research and remembrance of colonial Hartford’s least-visible population, with a website and database to make the research accessible. Dr. Hermes’ goal was to make the findings usable for everyone, from students and scholars to the family genealogist and merely curious, and to honor the lives and deaths of hundreds of people who have no other public marker of their time here. A project of the Ancient Burying Ground Association, Hartford, the award-winning pilot program is now serving as a model to inspire other Connecticut burying-ground and cemetery groups to uncover the stories of their earliest Black and Indigenous residents.

Celebration of New Haven Revolutionary War Patriots

monday, july 4, 2022
9 a.m.

This July 4th, members of the Greater New Haven community will gather at 9 a.m. at the historic Grove Street Cemetery to celebrate American independence. Organized by the General David Humphreys Branch of the Connecticut Society of the Sons of the American Revolution, this joyful event will honor all 56 signers of the U.S. Declaration of Independence and local veterans of the Revolutionary War. All are welcome to attend.

Celebration of New Haven
Revolutionary War Patriots

sunday, july 4, 2021
9 a.m.

This July 4th, members of the Greater New Haven community will gather at 9 a.m. at the historic Grove Street Cemetery to celebrate American independence. Organized by the General David Humphreys Branch of the Connecticut Society of the Sons of the American Revolution, this joyful event will honor all 56 signers of the U.S. Declaration of Independence and local veterans of the Revolutionary War. All are welcome to attend.

Cradle Grave Planting

friday and saturday, may 14 and 15, 2021
10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.
grove street cemetery, 227 grove street

The Friends of the Grove Street Cemetery are starting on a new project to plant flowers in the cradle graves found throughout the cemetery. These are special tombstones that were intentionally designed to hold the small flower gardens which were once tended by the family of the deceased. These spaces have long been vacant of plantings, and we will see them bloom again this summer! The Grove Street Gardeners will be planting 24 cradle graves this Friday and Saturday, May 14 and 15, from 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Join us! Bring a trowel (and an optional watering can); plants will be provided, and there is free parking inside the cemetery. 

Remembering New Haven Women: Four Centuries of Women’s History

thursday, october 24, 2019
5:30 p.m.
new haven museum, 114 Whitney Avenue

Join the Friends of the Grove Street Cemetery for a talk, “Remembering New Haven Women: Four Centuries of Women’s History Inscribed in Grove Street Cemetery.”
 

Admission is free and open to the public. Presented in partnership with the New Haven Museum.

Celebration of New Haven Revolutionary War Patriots

Wednesday, July 4, 2018
9 a.m.

This July 4th, members of the Greater New Haven community will gather at 9 a.m. at the historic Grove Street Cemetery to celebrate American independence. Organized by the General David Humphreys Branch of the Connecticut Society of the Sons of the American Revolution, this joyful event will honor all 56 signers of the U.S. Declaration of Independence and local veterans of the Revolutionary War. All are welcome to attend.

Memorial Day Civil War Tour

Monday, May 28, 2018
10:30 a.m.

Join us for a Memorial Day tour of Civil War graves and memorials in Grove Street Cemetery. The tour will be led by Myles Alderman and will visit monuments to admirals, generals, and infantrymen with ties to New Haven. Admission is free and open to the public. Tour will meet inside the cemetery gate.

Gina’s Journey: The Search for William Grimes

Monday, February 5, 2018
5:30 p.m.

Attend a special screening of this movie at the New Haven Museum with author Regina Mason and filmmaker/producer Sean Durant. Winner of the Roots Award at the 15th Annual Oakland International Film Festival in 2017, the film offers an inspiring story based on Mason’s odyssey to New Haven and Litchfield to research William Grimes, her great-great-great-grandfather, and his flight from slavery. While working with former librarian James Campbell at the New Haven Museum, Mason discovered the only known image of Grimes—the engraving on the 1855 cover of his autobiography, a pioneering slave narrative first published in 1825. Grimes lived and worked in New Haven and is buried in Grove Street Cemetery.

Durant’s filmmaking conveys not only Mason’s long road to uncover her past, but also the unimaginable conditions that Grimes faced as he struggled to free himself from slavery and the hardships he endured as a free man in the North.

Admission is free.

Presented in partnership with the New Haven Museum, Amistad Committee Inc., and Friends of the Grove Street Cemetery.

Memorial Day Civil War Tour

Monday, May 29, 2017
10:30 a.m.

Join us for a Memorial Day tour of Civil War graves and memorials in Grove Street Cemetery. The tour will be led by Myles Alderman and will visit monuments to admirals, generals, and infantrymen with ties to New Haven.

Governor’s Foot Guard July 4 Celebration

Saturday, July 4, 2016

Grove Street Cemetery will again be celebrating the July 4th holiday with the Governor’s Foot Guard and honoring David Humphreys as part of this celebration. The festivities will begin at 9 a.m. Please come join us.

For Memorial Day: A Tour to Honor Civil War Veterans in Grove Street Cemetery

Monday, May 30, 2016
10:30 a.m.

Please join us for a tour led by Myles Alderman, which begins at the Grove Street Cemetery gate at 10:30 am. This event is free of charge and open to the public.

Governor’s Foot Guard July 4 Celebration

Saturday, July 4, 2015

Grove Street Cemetery will again be celebrating the July 4th holiday with the Governor’s Foot Guard and honoring David Humphreys as part of this celebration. The festivities will begin at 9 a.m. Please come join us.

For Memorial Day: A Tour of Civil War Veterans in Grove Street Cemetery

Monday, May 25, 2015

Please join us for a tour led by Myles Alderman, which begins at the Grove Street Cemetery gate at 10:30 am. This event is free of charge and open to the public.

Colonial Gravestones & the Typographic Standard

Saturday, April 25, 2015

The Friends of the Grove Street Cemetery and the Faculty of Graphic Design at Yale School of Art invite you to attend a tour and lecture by Nicholas Benson, proprietor of the John Stevens Shop in Newport, Rhode Island.
 

The tour begins at the Grove Street Cemetery gate at 2:30 pm. The lecture takes place at 4 pm in the Yale School of Art sculpture building at 36 Edgewood Avenue (between Howe and Park streets), New Haven. An informal reception will follow. This event is free of charge and open to the public.

This stone—marking Carl Lohmann’s grave in Grove Street Cemetery—was carved by John Howard Benson, Nicholas Benson’s grandfather, at the John Stevens Shop.