Glendale Cemetery — Attraction in Akron

Glendale Cemetery in Akron, Ohio is a "must see" cemetery. It's the oldest cemetery in Akron. The buildings, mausoleums and tombstones are unique in many areas. The Civil War Chapel is still used as a stopping point after Memorial Day parades. The cemetery is probably now nearly 200 years older or older. The lush grounds are hilly and simply beautiful to visit. I lived in the caretaker house till I was nearly 5 years old. We lived in the upstairs apartment that Carl and Margie Warren had made and my birth paternal grandparents lived downstairs. When it rained hard the basement would flood to the top stair on the first floor. It was a quiet place to live and my birth grandfather was caretaker of the cemetery. It was a busy time then. I recently went back and met with my cousin, Fritz, the day after his Mom's funeral, my Aunt Margie was buried. The historical house was now having to be rented to the caretaker and the wooden garage had been taken down decades before when it rotted. The office looked a little different on the outside, but real different on the inside. On July 2nd, 2014, the cemetery looked great. The Civil War Chapel and Bell Tower were still there along with many mausoleums we used to walk by quite often. We used to walk all over the place there. Chief Big Buffalo worked there for awhile. He used to be in Bill Cody's Wild West Show until Bill Cody died. He was with a carnival when he quit and moved into a hotel in downtown Akron. He always wore a garland of cloves to ward away evil spirits and used to babysit me when my birth father didn't know what to do with me. I loved Chief so much. He told me many fascinating stories and even adopted me as his Cherokee granddaughter. I didn't find out till 2012, that my brother and I are 1/8th Cherokee because my birth paternal grandmother was 1/2 Cherokee. Through looking in lists of different tribes compiled from the U.S. Government and through DNA testing, by Ancestry, it appears that she may have been a full Cherokee. Chief Big Buffalo and my birth family, who have passed, other than Fritz, are all buried in Glendale in a section they set aside and bought decades ago. It's a historical site...

Founded in 1839, Akron Rural Cemetery has been renamed to Glendale Cemetery. One of the "park" cemeteries like Mount Auburn near Cambridge Massachusetts and Hollywood in Richmond Virginia and Pere La Chaise in Paris, this uses the hills and promontories to present a more idyllic landscape compared to the flat "lawn" cemeteries.

Quiet lanes for driving through or get a good workout by parking and then taking a hike. Politicians and industrialists and regular people are laid to reset here, with perhaps the most well known being Frank Seiberling (1859 to 1955) who founded the Goodyear Tire company that is based here in Akron.

Plenty to see here and of course, a peaceful spot for a walk. Please remember that this is an "active" cemetery so be...

If there's a school or a street anywhere in the Akron area, there's a good chance you'll find its namesake's remains reposing below some ornate headstone in Akron's beautiful and historic Glendale cemetery. The founder of what is now the University of Akron (once Buchtel College) John R. Buchtel, lies buried there, as does the man whom the nearby city of Barberton is named after, Ohio C. Barber. The list of local founding fathers buried there reads like an index from a comprehensive history of Summit County: Robinson, Sumner, Voris, Seiberling, Hower, Litchfield...and...