 Cover: Detail of the Caldwell Mausoleum, c. 1920. This statue of an angel inside the Gothic Revival Caldwell Mausoleum exemplifies the attention to detail and the artistry found in the funerary art of Mobile's Magnolia Cemetery. (Photograph by Mark Halseth, Courtesy Friends of Magnolia Cemetery)
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Fall
1994, Issue 34 Mobile's Magnolia
Cemetery is rich in tradition and folklore, as the burial ground for
Alabama governors, congressmen, mayors, generals, doctors, lawyers,
writers, plague victims, Jews, free blacks, society women, and even
Apache warriors. But the story of Magnolia Cemetery itself is rich;
its existence parallels the evolution of cemeteries in the United States,
while its exceptional sculpture strikingly demonstrates the Victorian
acceptance, even celebration, of death. The article notes how the founding,
growth, neglect, and recent triumphant restoration of this nineteenth-century
cemetery make for an important story in our own death-denying age. General
Ormsby M. Mitchel , called "Old Stars" by his troops, swept into Huntsville
with the vanguard of the Third Division of the Army of the Ohio on the
morning of April 11, 1862. Author Kay Cornelius writes of Mitchel's
promise of military genius, noting the aggressive strategies which led
him to Huntsville, further into enemy territory than any other Union
leader. Also noted is his ongoing battle with the Union military bureaucracy
which often thwarted his efforts, as well as his stay in Huntsville,
where the local citizens reviled him as evil incarnate. This comes together
as the intriguing story of a man who made himself the object of so much
hatred on one hand and so much admiration on the other. In
1994, the National Trust for Historic Preservation launched a nationwide
effort to highlight historic places most endangered in this country.
This effort in Alabama, sponsored jointly by the Alabama Historical
Commission and the Alabama Preservation Alliance, aims to publicize
threatened historic places in the state through news releases and other
means. This article features the plights of ten such endangered sites,
ranging from the Marmaduke Williams House in Tuscaloosa to the Greyhound
Bus Station in Montgomery, each with its own important place and story
in the history of Alabama. ART
IN THE SOUTH - "W. C. Rice" by Kathy
Kemp, Photographs by Keith Boyer
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