Abstract:
Wilmington's Oakwood Cemetery is one of the most historic cemeteries in the South. The first person buried there was on February 5, 1855--Annie, daughter of the cemetery's president. Since then over 20,000 have been buried there, some extraordinary, others ordinary people. The cemetery still has about a hundred funerals a year. Eric Kozen, who has twenty-seven years in the horticulture business and who has been a site manager at Arlington National Cemetery, is the cemetery superintendent. In his article Rowe relates how Oakdale became the first cemetery in the state to be part of a Rural Garden Cemetery Movement and what relatives of the deceased did on Sundays.