East Lawn Memorial Park is a cemetery in East Sacramento,

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

. It is owned by East Lawn Memorial Parks & Mortuaries, which also owns two other

Sacramento ) , image_map = Sacramento County California Incorporated and Unincorporated areas Sacramento Highlighted.svg , mapsize = 250x200px , map_caption = Location within Sacramento ...

area cemeteries. Founded in 1904, it is the resting place of several former Mayors of Sacramento as well as other public figures.

History

The cemetery was founded in October 1904, in response to the Edwards Break Flood of 1904. The first burials took place on December 24th of that year. During the early 1900s the park was administered by the East Lawn Cemetery Association. The cemetery has a two-story mausoleum that was completed in 1926, after several years of public opposition, led by a developer that had hoped to transition the memorial land into a residential zone. Despite the city council’s approval of the variance require to build the mausoleum, the developer put the issue on the upcoming election ballot. During the campaign, East Lawn made public statements that the families of those interred would not give their permission to move the remains of their loved ones beneath the ground of the cemetery. In 2013 the park began to transition from vegetation to rock based gardens where appropriate to contend with seasonal drought conditions and water availability problems in northern California. In November of that year the cemetery had its one hundred thousandth interment. Those interred in the cemetery include actor

Neville Brand Lawrence Neville Brand (August 13, 1920 – April 16, 1992) was an American soldier and actor. He was known for playing villainous or antagonistic character roles in Westerns, crime dramas, and ''films noir'', and was nominated for a BAFTA Awa ...

, professional baseball player James M. Grilk, composer

Dick Jurgens Richard Henry Jurgens (January 9, 1910 – October 5, 1995) was an American swing music bandleader and composer who enjoyed great popularity in the late 1930s and early 1940s. Life and early career Dick Jurgens was born in Sacramento, Californ ...

, congressman Robert Matsui, and actress Dorothy Millette Bern. Former Mayors of Sacramento buried here include William Land, Clinton White, Hiram Hendren, Joe Serna,

William Curtis William Curtis (11 January 1746 – 7 July 1799) was an English botanist and entomologist, who was born at Alton, Hampshire, site of the Curtis Museum. Curtis began as an apothecary, before turning his attention to botany and other natural ...

, and

Newton Earp Newton Jasper Earp (October 7, 1837 – December 18, 1928) was an American pioneer born in Kentucky in 1837. He was the eldest child of Nicholas Porter Earp and Abigail Storm. He was the half-brother of Old West lawmen Wyatt, Virgil, and Morgan ...

Events

The cemetery also holds public memorial events, such as a 2012 event memorializing the deaths of all indigents in the Sacramento area since its founding. Since 2003, the cemetery has dedicated memorials to those who have died in the region without a proper burial.

References

External links

*{{Official site, https://www.eastlawn.com/ 1904 establishments in California Companies based in Sacramento, California Cemeteries in Sacramento County, California