Just a Walk in the Park

I have always wanted to visit Crown Hill Cemetery in Indianapolis, so today I did just that. It was a wonderful day with plenty of sunshine and I walked for miles through the cemetery. I'll have to admit that even though I have been walking some lately after work, I hit it pretty hard today.

Crown Hill is the 3rd largest non-government cemetery in the United States and the highest point in Indianapolis is located at the James Whitcomb Riley monument atop Crown Hill. From there you can look down upon the city and you are provided with an excellent view. The cemetery is comprised of 555 acres of rolling hills and some magnificent trees. It is a very well manicured area that welcomes walkers, joggers, bicyclists and just curious old fogeys like me. There were several families having picnics on the grounds and I saw security officers patrolling through the area quite frequently.

There are more than 119,000 people interred at Crown Hill with many notable names from our Indiana history. Of course the James Whitcomb Riley legacy lives on with the fantastic work being done at Riley Children's Hospital and the man he was named for, James Whitcomb, a former governor of Indiana, is buried here as well. One of Riley's friends and a fellow writer, Booth Tarkinton, is also buried on the estate. Just a few feet from Tarkinton's monument are the graves of former President Benjamin Harrison and both of his wives. An interesting note about President Harrison and his first wife Caroline; they were the first to have electricity installed in the White House but would not flip any light switches because they were afraid of getting electrocuted.

I also located the tombstones of the three men buried at Crown Hill who served as Vice President of the United States; Thomas Hendricks, Thomas Marshall and Charles Fairbanks. Plus, I found the tombstone of George Washington Julian, a former U.S. Congressman who was also an unsuccessful candidate for Vice President back in 1852. Not far from there I found the tombstone and monument for Richard Jordan Gatling, the inventor of the Gatling Gun, which he manufactured in Indianapolis. Gatling really believed that if he invented a gun that would provide such a devastating killing effect, that the war would end earlier and less people would die from wartime diseases. Interesting point, maybe he was right. The Gatling Gun found little use until late in the Civil War because of several problems with the gun and because of typical bureaucratic red tape that delayed the purchase and delivery of the weapon.

While searching for the tombstone for Governor Orr, I happened on to a marker for General A.D. Streight. General Streight was an interesting character from the Civil War, who was fooled into surrendering his Brigade by Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest. Forrest's actions convinced Streight that Forrest had many more soldiers than he actually had. After spending several months in Libby Prison, Streight and several of his officers escaped and made it safely to the Union lines. He later unsuccessfully campaigned for the Republican nomination for Governor of Indiana. As a side note, I found the grave of General E.R.S. Canby, who later accepted the surrender of General Nathan Bedford Forrest. After the Civil War, General Canby was appointed Commander of the Pacific Northwest. During a meeting with the Modocs at Tule Lake, California, while he was attempting to negotiate a peace treaty, one of the Modoc leaders, Captain Jack, pulled out a gun and killed General Canby. Canby, who had attended Wabash College prior to going to West Point and had married a lady from Crawfordsville, was returned for burial at Crown Hill. Remember "Tule Lake" because it will come up again shortly in an article I've been doing some research on from the Second World War.

After a good little trek, I finally located Governor Orr's tombstone and the marker for Oliver Hazard Perry Morton, who was the Indiana Governor during the Civil War. A couple of other notable Hoosiers who I found were Eli Lilly and Robert Irsay. Mr. Irsay, if you remember, was the guy who spirited the Colts out of Baltimore in the middle of the night and brought them to Indianapolis. He has a very nice tombstone that just says Irsay and has a horseshoe above his name.

After hiking back to the car to get a drink, I was smart enough to bring some water for the trip, but not smart enough to carry it, I decided that I would drive to the John Dillinger grave marker. I drove around for a few minutes and became disoriented, either due to the possibility of dehydration or from the agonizing pain in my ankles, so I decided to save Dillinger's grave for my next visit to Crown Hill. I have come to the realization that my poor ankles and knees, which so ably carried this torso for many years at a much lesser weight, are now in rebellion because of the extra heavy duty that they are now required to perform. I do think that I should now make an effort to relieve them of some of this burden for future outings such as this one today. Once the pain goes away, I'm going to start working out more.