Doctor David Hewett recently did a walking tour of Oakland Cemetery. I could not attend but he posted some reflections of that tour on his blog here. Dr. Hewitt, Botanist, from the Academy of Natural Science and walking with him outdoors is like taking a trip back in time. I look at a tree and see a tall thing made of wood. He looks at a tree and see history.
In between Friends Hospital and Greenwood Cemetery, just a bit off Roosevelt Boulevard in Philadelphia, is Oakland Cemetery. Friends Hospital, founded
in 1813, is the oldest private psychiatric hospital in the US, and it also has a beautiful landscape – with its azaleas along the way down to Tacony Creek behind it, with its enormous American elm tucked away into a corner behind one of its buildings, and with the many other trees and flowers dotting and shading it throughout, it’s a surprising little refuge of calm and color in the city, as traffic along the Boulevard rushes by, just beyond the gates and fence of the hospital’s grounds.
You should read the rest of the story here. It is well worth your time and you might want to take the next walking tour when it comes along.
Thanks for Mary Ellen Post for the tip.
