Cypress Lawn Memorial Park, established by Hamden Holmes Noble in 1892, is a rural cemetery located in Colma, California, a place known as the "City of the Silent".

History

<!--thumb|left|Cypress Lawn Memorial Park, viewed from the western slope of [[San Bruno Mountain]]-->

thumb|left|upright=1|1892 entrance gate from [[California State Route 82|El Camino Real to East Campus]]

Noble was a Civil War veteran who moved to California in 1865 and was a member of the San Francisco Stock Exchange prior to founding Cypress Lawn. On March 9, 1892, Noble was granted a permit to establish a non-sectarian cemetery and plans for Cypress Lawn were made public as work had begun on a mortuary chapel and receiving vault. Noble was responsible for the initial layout and landscape architecture of the cemetery. and completed in 1893. A crematory also was completed in 1893, housed in a building designed by Albert Pissis and William P. Moore; it was damaged beyond repair during the 1957 San Francisco earthquake and subsequently demolished. Between February 1940 until 1945, many of the remains from the Lone Mountain Cemetery complex in San Francisco had been moved to Cypress Lawn Memorial Park and were placed in a mound. In 1993, a memorial obelisk was added to the grassy mound to commemorate those that had been re-interred.

The cemetery was among those profiled in the PBS documentary A Cemetery Special (2005) by Rick Sebak.

Site

The original cemetery occupies east of El Camino Real and west of Hillside Boulevard and is known as the East Campus; the site was expanded by west of El Camino, acquired in 1901, named the West Campus.

Several structures are on the original (East Campus) site, including the 1892 entrance gate, the Noble Chapel and Crematory, named for the founder and completed in 1894, and the original columbarium, completed in 1895 to a design by Edward Hatherton and T. Paterson Ross. The Lakeside Columbarium, also on the East Campus, was designed by Bernard J. S. Cahill and started in 1927, but construction was suspended in 1930 due to the Great Depression and never resumed.

Since 2020, an annual Arboretum day is held in November to celebrate the site's trees, some of which were selected and planted by Noble. One of the notable trees on the original campus is a Monterey cypress which was estimated to be planted before 1906.

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File:The Architect and engineer of California and the Pacific Coast (1916) (14763178932).jpg|Public Mausoleum (West Campus, 1916)

File:Cypress Lawn, Hillside entrance.jpg|Eastern entrance to East Campus, from Hillside Blvd

File:Cypress Lawn Memorial Park, Colma, California 9.jpg|Noble Chapel (East Campus, 1894)

File:Cypress Lawn Memorial Park, Colma, California 14.jpg|Original columbarium (East Campus, 1895)

File:Hillside Gardens of Cypress Lawn 2.jpg|Entrance gate to Hillside Gardens

File:Mount Olivet cemetery, Colma California 5.jpg|Olivet Gardens garden court

File:Cypress Lawn Memorial Park, Colma, California 2.jpg|Floral topiary sign and tourist trolleys (West Campus)

File:Cypress Lawn cemetery, Colma, California 2.jpg|Catacombs and Administration buildings (West Campus)

</gallery>

Notable burials

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File:Phoebe Hearst Grave site.jpg|Hearst family mausoleum

File:Thomas O. Larkin grave front.JPG|Thomas O. Larkin

File:Lefty O'Doul grave.jpg|Lefty O'Doul

File:Angel of Grief Pool.jpg|Jennie Roosevelt Pool memorial marked with the Angel of Grief

</gallery>

Cypress Lawn Memorial Park is the final resting site for several members of the celebrated Hearst family, people from the California Gold Rush, plus other prominent citizens from the city of San Francisco and nearby surroundings. By 1992, more than 300,000 had been interred at the site. Two others, Canadian Army soldiers, are alternatively commemorated on a special memorial in Greenlawn Memorial Park in Colma.

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A

  • Isabella Macdonald Alden (1841–1930), writer
  • Izora Armstead (1942–2004), singer and member of The Weather Girls
  • Gertrude Franklin (Horn) Atherton (1857–1948), author
  • David Colbreth Broderick (1820–1859), U.S. Senator from California; opponent of slavery, considered martyred in a duel by a pro-slavery opponent
  • John C. Cremony (1815–1879), soldier, author, newsman
  • Joseph Paul Cretzer (1911–1946), bank robber and prisoner, died in the escape attempt known as the "Battle of Alcatraz"
  • Laura Hope Crews (1879–1942), actress
  • William H. Crocker (1861–1937), banker
  • Anne McKee Armstrong de Saint Cyr (1864–1925), philanthropist, mother of Princess Miguel of Braganza, Duchess of Viseu
  • Jean de Saint Cyr (1875–1966), playboy third husband of Anne McKee Armstrong de Saint Cyr

F

  • Abby Fisher (–1915), former slave and cookbook author
  • Eddie Fisher (1928–2010), entertainer
  • James Clair Flood (1826–1889), "Bonanza King"

H

  • Andrew Smith Hallidie (1836–1900), first cable car system designer, Inventor
  • George Hearst (1820–1891), businessman, father of William Randolph Hearst

L

  • Thomas O. Larkin (1802–1858), businessman, signer of the original California Constitution
  • Edna Loftus (1891–1916), British actress
  • Frederick Low (1828–1894), Congressman, California Governor, statesman

M

  • Willie McCovey (1938–2018), Major League Baseball Hall of Famer
  • Euthanasia Sherman Meade (1836–1895), first president of The Woman's Medical Club of California
  • Addison Mizner (1872–1933), architect
  • Tom Mooney (1882–1942), Wobblie, political prisoner

N

  • James Van Ness (1808–1872), 7th Mayor of San Francisco

O

  • Lefty O'Doul (1897–1969), Major League Baseball player
  • Joel Samuel Polack (1807–1882), trader, land speculator, writer and artist in pre-colonial New Zealand
  • Grace Gimmini Potts (1886–1956), author and director of pageants

R

  • Alvino Rey (1908–1980), jazz guitarist and bandleader

S

  • Calvin E. Simmons (1950–1982), musical prodigy, conductor, musician
  • Alma de Bretteville Spreckels (1881-1968), philanthropist