A visit — heck, let’s call it a pilgrimage — to Mt. Auburn Cemetery

Mt. Auburn Cemetery is well known as the nation’s first “garden cemetery” which, though now the norm, contrasted with the gloomy church yard or burial ground. But Mt. Auburn does it better than any I’ve seen and there lies the mortal remains of many a famous Universalist and Unitarian.

I joined dear friends, also Unitarian Universalist ministers, Hank Peirce and Adam Tierney-Eliot, there on March 17 to visit a just a couple of luminaries and brave the late-winter ice.

Hosea Ballou’s grave

Hosea Ballou's grave, side view

2014-03-17 10.30.18
Fanny Farmer is buried here with family.
John Murray’s grave, protected by ice.
Adam Tierney-Eliot (left) and Hank Peirce with token Unitarian, William Ellery Channing
Adam Tierney-Eliot (left) and Hank Peirce with token Unitarian, William Ellery Channing

By Scott Wells

Scott Wells, 46, is a Universalist Christian minister doing Universalist theology and church administration hacks in Washington, D.C.

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