Cemetery Scariness

Thursday afternoon, my mom and I spent some time with the hoi polloi of Chicago's deceased. While some of the graves we saw in Graceland Cemetery touched me on a personal level (architects Louis Sullivan, Daniel Burnham, and John Root; former governor Altgeld, who tried to defend pardon the shanghaied Haymarket convicts; and the guy who founded the Chicago Cubs and National League, whose name I think is William Hulbert but I forgot), some of them were scary as shit.

Who wouldn't be terrorized at "Eternal Silence," a sculpture at the grave of Dexter Graves (!), a Chicago hotel magnate?


This statue of seven year old Inez Clarke looks sweet and innocent. On a sunny afternoon, there's nothing remotely haunting about her, just very sad. However, stories abound.
One night, a cemetery caretaker walked by the glass case at night. It was still sealed shut, but the statue was gone. The caretaker quit the next day. Others reported seeing Inez wandering around the grounds. Scary.