AMERICAN AFTERLIFE American Afterlife ENCOUNTERS IN THE CUSTOMS OF MOURNING KATE SWEENEY Published by the University of Georgia Press Athens, Georgia 30602 www.ugapress.org © 2014 by Kate Sweeney All rights reserved Designed by Kaelin Chappell Broaddus Set in 9.7/14 Bodoni Twelve ITC by Kaelin Chappell Broaddus Manufactured by Thomson Shore, Inc. The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources. Most University of Georgia Press titles are available from popular e-book vendors. Printed in the United States of America 14 15 16 17 18 c 5 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Sweeney, Kate, 1978– American afterlife : encounters in the customs of mourning/ Kate Sweeney. pages cm Include bibliographical references. ISBN 978-0-8203-4600-7 (hardcover : alk. paper) ISBN 0-8203-4600-4 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Funeral rites and ceremonies—Unites States. 2. Mourning customs—United States. 3. Undertakers and undertaking—United States. 4. United States—Social life and customs. I. Title. GT3203.s94 2014 393—dc23 2013016629 British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data available ISBN for digital deition: 978-0-82034689-2 FOR Dennis AND Martha Sweeney, FOR ENCOURAGEMENT PAR EXCELLENCE Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak Whispers the o’erfraught heart, and bids it break. —SHAKESPEARE, Macbeth, Act IV, Scene 3 CONTENTS PREFACE CHAPTER 1 American Ways of Death CHAPTER 2 Gone, but Not Forgotten DISMAL TRADE Sarah Peacock, Memorial Tattoo Artist Under the Skin CHAPTER 3 The Cemetery’s Cemetery DISMAL TRADE Kay Powell, Obituary Writer The Doyenne Speaks CHAPTER 4 The Last Great Obit Writers’ Conference CHAPTER 5 Give Me That Old-Time Green Burial DISMAL TRADE Oana Hogrefe, Memorial Photographer Memory Maker CHAPTER 6 The House Where Death Lives DISMAL TRADE Lenette Hall, Owner, The Urngarden The Business at the Back of the Closet CHAPTER 7 With the Fishes DISMAL TRADE Anne Gordon, Funeral Chaplain Funerals Are Fun CHAPTER 8 Death by the Roadside AFTERWORD ACKNOWLEDGMENTS NOTES BIBLIOGRAPHY PREFACE I wrote early drafts of this book over three years while living in Wilmington, North Carolina, and Atlanta, Georgia. Most of the scenes—such as visits to Charleston, South Carolina, to take part in the Eternal Reefs memorial weekend and to Springfield, Illinois, to visit the Museum of Funeral Customs—took place between 2007 and 2008. I have since contacted everyone I could whose stories appear here in order to see if anything critical has changed that would alter these narratives. In one case—the story of the obituary—a great deal has changed. As it turns out, the newspaper’s sharp decline in recent years adds new poignancy and perspective to the events surrounding the last Great Obituarist Conference. While most of the scenes in these pages took place in 2007 and 2008, I have also updated all information regarding trends, facts, and figures. What you hold in your hands is a contemporary tale. Secondly, these are stories of ordinary people who find themselves involved in death and memorialization. For many, these decisions are inextricably linked to religious faith. Religion influences, to varying degrees, how people treat the dying just before and after death, when and whether they bury or cremate or both, and what these rites mean to people in the larger cosmological sense. While this work acknowledges religious beliefs, except in certain key historic moments in which they were inextricably tied to death customs, it focuses instead on personal choice as influenced by forces other than the spiritual. Finally, it is a great responsibility to write nonfiction about people and facts outside one’s personal life experiences. It’s one I have taken quite seriously. I am keenly aware that I’m no historian, but rather a writer of popular nonfiction. However, I worked hard to make sure that the facts portrayed here, including historic elements, are accurate. In the years I worked on this project, I learned a little about a great many subject areas—making me marvelous at dinner parties but hardly a comprehensive master of any one of these topics. Similarly, I logged many hours of interviews and follow-up conversations with the individuals whose voices appear here. While I work in service of the story and not the whim of its subjects, I sincerely hope that the resulting work resonates as accurate in fact and in tenor. I think every good writer wishes that. AMERICAN AFTERLIFE