The Origins of Glenwood

"Long may this fair enclosure be preserved, unmarred by mistaken taste – undesecrated by rude hands. Here the worn and weary citizens will find a momentary but soothing retreat from bustle and toil. Here may Sorrow and pensive Meditation ever find a home. And hither, let even the idle and the thoughtless come, to learn the lesson of their own mortality from the eloquent but unobtrusive teachings of the tomb.” - from 1857 Glen-Wood Brochure

This land is the ancestral homeland of many Indigenous nations, most recently the Anishinabeeg (including Potawatomi, Ojibwe, and Odawa) tribal nations. The image from a 1899 map shows Glenwood Cemetery within the area known then as Smith’s Reservation, created by the 1819 Treaty of Saginaw between Great Lakes tribes and the U.S. government, negotiated under the duress of the new nation’s westward expansion following the retreat of the British as the conclusion of the War of 1812. This is important to remember. We honor and respect the many Indigenous people, including those of the Three Fires Alliance, who are still connected to this land and the communities along today’s Flint River and throughout the state.

A True Flint Story

Flint, Michigan, was incorporated as a city in 1855 with a population of 2,000. Two years later, on January 17, 1857, citizens of the city met in the offices of George M. Dewey "for the purpose of making the preliminary arrangements to procure a cemetery suitable to the wants of our city," according to the minutes. William Stevenson, who would later become secretary of the Glenwood Cemetery Association, wrote that the cemetery "was not expected to be a money making venture. Its promoters wanted to have an attractive burial ground” within about two miles of the city. At the next meeting, on February 12, 1857, the committee recommended the land from out lots 6, 7, 8, and 9, plat of Thayer and Wright out lots, Section 9 of the former Smith Indian reservations, comprising thirty acres. The map of the cemetery grounds dated 1857 lists George T. Clark as civil engineer, and the minute book shows that Clark requested and was awarded a lot in the cemetery as payment for his work. A formal dedication ceremony was held October 28, 1857 and Glenwood became one of Michigan’s rural cemeteries with characteristic gardens, woodlands, and rolling terrain.

In 1901 a contiguous six-acre parcel to the east of the original section of the cemetery was purchased for future expansion. A partnership with the Michigan Mausoleum Company (a division of the American Mausoleum Company) built a public mausoleum containing 216 crypts on the highest point of land in this new, east portion of the cemetery. The Neoclassical structure was completed in 1914. In 1925 the cemetery association proceeded with platting of the 1901 addition into cemetery lots. The Flint firm of R. H. Randall & Co. acted as the supervising and designing engineers and platted the grounds in a lawn or park-lawn cemetery form.

Glenwood contains the Flint and Genesee County area's most notable assemblages of Victorian and early twentieth century funerary art and architecture. Along with its distinguished funerary art, Glenwood is notable for its funerary architecture, which includes four family mausoleums, one memorial of the canopy type, and the public mausoleum, all dating from the early twentieth century.

For more information about Glenwood’s origins and history, see the application for placement in the National Register of Historic Places available through the National Archives by clicking here.