All Is Perfect Quiet

Lancaster, Pennsylvania is a town full of historic markers denoting people and places of importance, but there is only one place which made front page headlines and sat on the forefront of a burning national issue—quite literally.¹

An unassuming road stretches along the northern boundary of Greenwood Cemetery in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Photo provided by the author.

Our historical journey begins at Greenwood Cemetery, a rolling graveyard once known to locals as home to Lancaster’s own Westminster Abbey. Walk beneath the guardian statue’s gaze as she weeps atop the gate, and then follow the winding path. Tucked away in the northeastern corner, hidden behind two lines of trees looms a curious structure: a red brick building featuring Gothic architecture and cathedral-like windows. It is a surprising sight to behold, if not for nearby trees, it would be impossible to miss. The only current locals who seem to know of the place are a family of vultures nesting in the long-abandoned chimney.

Waning sunbeams catch a glimpse of the Lancaster Crematorium in September 2024. Photo provided by the author.

Plain steel doors bar the entrance where traditional wood once stood, and the symmetrical host of arched windows have long since been shuttered and boarded. If you walk between the trees at sunset, and look up at the peak of the windows where the boards have fallen, you will catch a glimpse of vaulted ceilings and ornate stormy blue brackets illuminated within, breathing life into the deteriorating building for a few precious minutes. Unlike the wealth of historical signs in the city, there is no marker for the site beyond the large marble “Crematorium” etched into the front of the building. “1884” is carved into the keystone beneath the broken central window mimicking the dates on the surrounding graves.

Despite being the first public crematorium in the United States, there is an undeniable air of mystery surrounding the Lancaster Crematorium. Besides a short Wikipedia page containing the most basic of information and a bite-size article from Atlas Obscura, the trail to understanding Lancaster Crematorium’s enigmatic history is found in paper and ink from bygone centuries: newspaper archives.

An 1887 illustration of the Lancaster Crematorium, taken from the Sanitary Engineer and Construction Record as published by the Lancaster New Era.

On May 27, 1884, a committee of fifty-nine members met at the office of local Lancaster newspaper The Intelligencer to put into motion the building of the first public crematorium in the United States. The group would become known as the Lancaster Cremation and Funeral Reform Society. Doctors, scientists, businesspeople and reverends joined, all with a common goal: in a time where yellow fever ran rampant in the northeastern United States, cremation promised not only a means to keep the public safe, but according to the committee, a way in which to do it with the utmost cleanliness and respect.²

Together, the group purchased two acres of land overlooking the Conestoga River and set to work. The building, constructed by Philip Dinkelburg in the late Gothic revival style, featured modest red bricks and an iron roof.³ The auditorium would be adorned with pictures and urns, chairs and lounges to ensure both comfort and functionality. Dr. Miles L. Davis would see to the furnace construction, a design which shockingly lacked a smokestack. Instead, an ingenious combination of flues would dissipate the heat and gasses over a distance of one hundred feet, ensuring sanitation and making it impossible for anything to escape without being completely oxidized.⁴

Cremation applications began to pour in even before the Lancaster Crematorium was open thanks to referrals from LeMoyne Crematory, the first private crematorium in the United States.⁵ With the facility limiting its services to Washington county, Lancaster Crematorium was poised to fulfill the important role of the country’s first public crematorium.

An illustrative figure of the Lancaster Crematorium retorts, taken from the Sanitary Engineer and Construction Record and published by the Lancaster New Era also from 1887.

Despite the demand, cremation was still highly controversial. The church was cited as one of the most prolific protestors of the practice. At the time, burials were regarded as Christian, while burnings were associated with pagan rites.⁶ Thus the committee adopted an immediate approach of transparency, openly sharing plans, drawings, and studies with newspapers in hopes of assuaging local fears. Publications like Lancaster New Era and the New York Sanitary Engineer and Construction Record featured diagrams, figures, floorplans and tables of gas enumeration values.

Even with such transparency, these efforts did little to placate critics. Ministers and public speakers were employed to rally opposition and sway public opinion. One anti-cremation preacher was hired to perform a series of four sermons speaking against cremation, “but became so heated and lengthy in his first two sermons that he exhausted his entire store of protests and was compelled to discontinue the series,” according to a retrospective 1929 Sunday News article.⁷

On November 25, 1884, the body of Mrs. Christiana Beseler arrived in Lancaster by train from Jersey City, whereupon she was escorted to the crematorium by her husband, Mr. Frederick Beseler. A small host of reverends, members of the National Crematorium Association of Philadelphia, the Lancaster Crematorium Society, and others joined him there. The first public cremation was performed with success.⁸

In an 1886 book, every element of a crematorium was outlined in painstaking detail, from the specifications of the building and furnace to forms and funerary practices—including a distinct lack of actual burning.⁹ The crematorium’s innovative flue design enabled heat to circle the retort three times, causing the body to oxidize into a fine, white mist. “During the process there is nothing offensive or calculated to grate upon the most tender sensibility. All is perfect quiet. There is no burning.”¹⁰

When reading these early accounts surrounding the Lancaster Crematorium and its cremations, it is hard not to feel a macabre sense of enchantment. Doctors and progressive reverends alike passionately described the process with profound reverence…”[W]hat nature has so perfectly formed in life appears to gently, quietly melt away in death, and becomes resolved into its original elements.”¹¹

Further testimony from Rev. Dr. Beecher would only serve to reiterate the near romanticism. “All that belongs to the earth of him we loved we gather in their whiteness and have given to the earth. All that belonged to the air we set free to fly away on invisible wings in the sunshine.”¹²

After dozens of successful cremations and growing support from multiple communities, pervasive fears and public superstition still fueled critics. Rampant misinformation also continued to mount among locals, insisting fumes and contaminated air despite all evidence to the contrary. Some even went so far as threatening to demolish the crematorium.

In 1904, after twenty years of operation, the crematorium closed its doors following the deaths of Lancaster Crematorium society trustees George K. Reed and D. G. Eschleman.¹³ A petition to sell the property and divide its remaining assets was presented, and the society itself would disband in 1905. But while Lancaster’s experiment had seemingly failed, the seeds of reform had been sown; the movement had gained momentum and new crematoriums were being built.

For decades, the Lancaster Crematorium remained abandoned, relegated to its new role as storage shed before succumbing to decay and vandalism. Articles grew more scarce and rife with misinformation. Less than three decades after its closing, much of its history had already been lost to conjecture. In a September 26, 1925 issue of the Sunday News, the periodical claimed the crematorium opened in 1886, not 1884. The first for whom the furnace was lit was no longer Mrs. Christana Beseler from New Jersey, but a wealthy businessman from Philadelphia. Hundreds of publicly documented cremations had dwindled down to a claim of only twenty-five people in nineteen years. In 1953, the Sunday News incorrectly claimed the crematorium stayed open “little more than five years, if that long.”¹⁴

It was not until nearly one hundred years after its initial opening that the Lancaster Crematorium would return to the public eye once more thanks to the efforts of Terry Shamberger, then-president of Greenwood Cemetery. In a 1981 article of the Intelligencer Journal, standing in front of the Lancaster Crematorium, Terry affectionately confessed “I’m kind of a history buff and this facility should have national recognition.”¹⁵ After securing $250,000 in funding to restore the crematorium, the National Register of Historic Places approved its historic registry status on April 14, 1983.¹⁶ From there, the Lancaster Crematorium resumed cremations in 1984, this time with a smaller, digitized furnace, before the furnaces would finally go out for good with the arrival of more modern crematoriums in the 1990s.

Which brings us to today. Once again, the crematorium sits silent. The windows broken, the shutters splintered and boarded tighter than ever. There is no publicly visible marker to commemorate its historic status, no blue sign with neat gold print to denote its national significance or the lasting effect it had on our funerary practices. What remains of its history is firmly locked away beyond view, buried deep in Lancaster’s newspapers and archives. An alluring, yet tragically nostalgic reminder of how significant places may be so easily lost when left out of sight.

The cremation movement, however, did find purchase in our modern lives. Over half of United States citizens are cremated upon their deaths today.¹⁷ Thus a hidden one hundred and forty year old crematorium quietly leaves its mark upon our history: not yet gone, and hopefully, a little less forgotten.

Lancaster Crematorium in 2011. Wikimedia Commons.

1. Famous markers include the Fulton Opera House, a 19th century opera house named in honor of the world’s first commercial steamboat inventor Robert Fulton, who has his own historic marker in Lancaster county, as well as the grave of 15th president of the United States James Buchanan, who rests in the neighboring Woodward Cemetery. Over 80 markers are present in Lancaster county and can be visited virtually via LancasterOnline, accessed October 26, 2024. https://lancasteronline.com/features/together/lancaster-countys-80-historical-markers-in-one-map-how-many-have-you-visited/article_2b1ebe98-e9d6-11e8-8751-f7dd548e2d96.html
2. Cremation: History of the Movement in Lancaster, Pa., with an Account of the Building, Furnace, Other Apparatus and the Processes. Rules and Regulations (Lancaster Cremation and Funeral Reform Society, 1886), 7. https://books.google.com/books?id=HsArAQAAMAAJ.
3. Philip Dinkelberg was contracted to build the Lancaster Crematorium under the direction of the Building Committee (Dr. Miles L. Davis, Geo. K. Reed, and W.B. Middleton). Not to be confused with his son and namesake, Frederick Philip Dinkelberg, who became a famous architect best known for his work on the iconic Flatiron Building in New York City, as well as the Santa Fe, Heyworth, and Jewelers’ Buildings in Chicago, Illinois. “Cremation. Dedication of the Crematorium.” The Lancaster Examiner, November 26, 1884, 4.https://www.newspapers.com/image/562095311.
4. Cremation: History of the Movement in Lancaster, Pa. (Lancaster Cremation and Funeral Reform Society, 1886), 6. https://books.google.com/books?id=HsArAQAAMAAJ
5. The LeMoyne Crematory is located in Pennsylvania but on the opposite side of the state from Lancaster. By today’s standards, it would be a four hour drive from Lancaster.
6. “Cremation. Hygienic and Theological Views of the Subject,” Intelligencer Journal, November 25, 1884, 1. https://www.newspapers.com/image/557163792/.
7. “Artistic Ad Writer Described Our Crematory As A Medium For Etherealization Of The Body!” Sunday News, May 5, 1929, 15.https://www.newspapers.com/image/566747446/.
8. “Cremation. Dedication of the Crematorium.” The Lancaster Examiner, November 26, 1884, 4.https://www.newspapers.com/image/562095311.
9. What an incredible time we live in that a small, obscure nineteen-page book circulated in 1886 that’s scarcely more than a pamphlet can be viewed in full thanks to the University of Chicago digitizing their copy in 2011. It was originally circulated as a proactive means to guide the movement, and as the title elaborately describes, the book truly does cover the complete, History of the Movement in Lancaster, Pa., with an Account of the Building, Furnace, Other Apparatus and the Processes. Rules and Regulations. Illustrated. You can view the book in full here: https://books.google.com/books?id=HsArAQAAMAAJ
10. Cremation: History of the Movement in Lancaster, Pa. 6, 9.
11. Cremation: History of the Movement in Lancaster, Pa. 9.
12. Cremation: History of the Movement in Lancaster, Pa. 13.
13. A small notice in the bottom right corner of the paper: “To Sell Crematorium.” Lancaster Intelligencer, February 13, 1904, 1.https://www.newspapers.com/image/557497524/
14. According to the personal account of then-78 year old Greenwood Cemetery secretary-treasurer John H. Myers, tucked into the very center of the paper: “Kids Watched Cremations Here In 80’s.” Sunday News, October 25, 1953, 17. https://www.newspapers.com/image/560970977/
15. Jon Ferguson. “City Crematory Takes Aim At Historic Status, Restart”. Intelligencer Journal, February 23, 1983, p.36. https://www.newspapers.com/image/563023175/
16. National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places Metadata, accessed October 26, 2024.https://npgallery.nps.gov/NRHP/AssetDetail/85966267-3bc2-4f88-8af8-dd1e89962362
17. “Statistics,” National Funeral Directors Association, accessed November 21, 2024 https://nfda.org/news/statistics