Forest Lawn-Long Beach is a 38-acre

mortuary A morgue or mortuary (in a hospital or elsewhere) is a place used for the storage of human corpses awaiting identification (ID), removal for autopsy, respectful burial, cremation or other methods of disposal. In modern times, corpses have cus ...

and

memorial garden A memorial is an object or place which serves as a focus for the memory or the commemoration of something, usually an influential, deceased person or a historical, tragic event. Popular forms of memorials include landmark objects or works of a ...

Long Beach, California Long Beach is a city in Los Angeles County, California. It is the 42nd-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 466,742 as of 2020. A charter city, Long Beach is the seventh-most populous city in California. Incorporate ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. The gardens were established as Sunnyside Memorial Gardens in 1921 by Cecil E. Bryan, Sr., an

entrepreneur Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value. With this definition, entrepreneurship is viewed as change, generally entailing risk beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business, which may include other values th ...

whose family operated the facility for three generations. Sunnyside was one of the first major cemeteries in Long Beach. Over the years it served the local area, but fell into disrepair by the 1970s. and was purchased in 1978 by

Forest Lawn Memorial-Parks & Mortuaries Forest Lawn Memorial-Parks & Mortuaries is an American corporation that owns and operates a chain of cemeteries and mortuaries in Los Angeles, Orange, and Riverside counties in Southern California. History The company was founded by a group o ...

. They renovated the facility, and renamed it Forest Lawn – Sunnyside in deference to its history—later changed to Forest Lawn – Long Beach to match their other properties. The park was built with Spanish Colonial architecture, and has a number of noticeable features. The prominent Spanish Renaissance-style Cathedral Tower was designed by the Bryan family and the architect Clarence L. Jay, and has been a landmark since its construction in 1924–1925. There are elaborately designed doorways and arches, large Spanish windows in art glass, imported marbles, and tiling. Long Beach resident Frank Julious Fisher created the intricate stencils and woodcarvings tracing the walls of the mausoleum. The marble was done by Lohr Marble Company in Pasadena, and restored by them in 1978. This was the first mausoleum to be equipped with Deagan tower chimes and pipe organ, and the only one with an echo organ in conjunction with its regular pipe organ. The Memorial Chapel, in adobe and red tile architecture, also reflects early California's Spanish and Mexican lineage. Created by Benjamin Mako and his team of artists, the stained glass windows display California history from 1769 to 1909. Beyond the stained glass window there is a carved

reredos A reredos ( , , ) is a large altarpiece, a screen, or decoration placed behind the altar in a church. It often includes religious images. The term ''reredos'' may also be used for similar structures, if elaborate, in secular architecture, for ex ...

leading toward the mural interpretation of The Ascension of Christ, created by R. Brownell McGrew. The Rotunda contains the statue of the mythological figure Danae; the statue hall features busts of

Constantine the Great Constantine I ( , ; la, Flavius Valerius Constantinus, ; ; 27 February 22 May 337), also known as Constantine the Great, was Roman emperor from AD 306 to 337, the first one to Constantine the Great and Christianity, convert to Christiani ...

Charlemagne Charlemagne ( , ) or Charles the Great ( la, Carolus Magnus; german: Karl der Große; 2 April 747 – 28 January 814), a member of the Carolingian dynasty, was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and the first Holy ...

, St. Augustine,

Dante Alighieri Dante Alighieri (; – 14 September 1321), probably baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri and often referred to as Dante (, ), was an Italian poet, writer and philosopher. His ''Divine Comedy'', originally called (modern Italian: '' ...

Desiderius Erasmus Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus (; ; English: Erasmus of Rotterdam or Erasmus;''Erasmus'' was his baptismal name, given after St. Erasmus of Formiae. ''Desiderius'' was an adopted additional name, which he used from 1496. The ''Roterodamus'' wa ...

William Tyndale William Tyndale (; sometimes spelled ''Tynsdale'', ''Tindall'', ''Tindill'', ''Tyndall''; – ) was an English biblical scholar and linguist who became a leading figure in the Protestant Reformation in the years leading up to his executi ...

John Knox John Knox ( gd, Iain Cnocc) (born – 24 November 1572) was a Scottish minister, Reformed theologian, and writer who was a leader of the country's Reformation. He was the founder of the Presbyterian Church of Scotland. Born in Giffordgat ...

John Milton John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet and intellectual. His 1667 epic poem '' Paradise Lost'', written in blank verse and including over ten chapters, was written in a time of immense religious flux and political ...

Thomas Jefferson Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 18 ...

and

Ralph Waldo Emerson Ralph Waldo Emerson (May 25, 1803April 27, 1882), who went by his middle name Waldo, was an American essayist, lecturer, philosopher, abolitionist, and poet who led the transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century. He was seen as a champ ...

. There is also a “Paradise” mosaic, a rendition of

Raphael Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino, better known as Raphael (; or ; March 28 or April 6, 1483April 6, 1520), was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. List of works by Raphael, His work is admired for its clarity of form, ease of ...

's fresco, and a

Foucault pendulum The Foucault pendulum or Foucault's pendulum is a simple device named after French physicist Léon Foucault, conceived as an experiment to demonstrate the Earth's rotation. A long and heavy pendulum suspended from the high roof above a circular a ...

, one of eight in Southern California.

Notable interments

References

External links

Forest Lawn Memorial Park
* {{Coord, 33.8429, -118.1692, type:landmark_region:US-CA, display=title Cemeteries in Los Angeles County, California Geography of Long Beach, California 1921 establishments in California