|
I modsætning til, hvad man
kunne forestille sig, ligger der kun to mennesker begravet her under
alle disse monumenter, nemlig Frederick og Anna Bessie Osborne Tanzer.
Frederick Tanzer, søn af
østrigsk fødte forældre, Joseph og Marie Tanzer,
var født i Brooklyn, New York, den 6. oktober 1861, og kom til
San Diego i 1906.
Anna Bessie Osborne, datter af
William og Marie Osborne, var født i Inwood, Indiana, den 12.
juli, 1870, og kom til San Diego i 1894.
De flotte statuer dækker
et område sammensat af seksten individuelle gravsteder.
Bessie, som Fred havde giftet
sig med omkring 1908, efter sin første kone Marys død,
havde fantaseret sig til det overdådige gravsted, havde tegnet
det, og havde ønsket sig det, og Fred købte det til
hende, da hun døde 4. juni 1915.
Han lod de mange monumenter
installere, men da han var arbejdsmand, og bestemt ikke formuende,
købte han statuerne på klods.
Fred havde så vidt vides
ingen børn, og statuerne står til ære for venner
og familiemedlemmer, blandt andet slægtninge i New York og
Østrig. Men ingen af dem er begravet her, kun Bessie og Fred,
som skrev udtrykkeligt på en af stenene, at de ikke
ønskede, at andre skulle begraves her nogensinde.
Den 11. december 1938 døde
Frederik Tanzer, pengeløs og stadig i gæld til den
stenhugger, der havde solgt ham statuerne. Efter hans død
krævede firmaet statuerne tilbage, men Greenwood Memorial Park
besluttede sig til at beholde statuerne på graven og i stedet
betale den udstående gæld. |
Despite what one could
reasonably assume, there are only two people buried here under all
these monuments, namely Frederick and Anna Bessie Osborne Tanzer.
Frederick Tanzer, son of
Austrian born parents Joseph and Marie Tanzer, was born in Brooklyn,
New York, October 6, 1861, and came to San Diego in 1906.
Anna Bessie Osborne, daughter of
William and Marie Osborne, was born in Inwood, Indiana, July 12,
1870, and came to San Diego in 1894.
The beautiful statues cover an
area of sixteen individual adjoining gravesites.
Bessie, whom Fred had married
about 1908 after the death of his first wife Mary, had imagined this
opulent gravesite, she had designed it, and she had wanted it, and
Fred bought it for her when she died June 4, 1915.
He had the many monuments
installed, but since he was a laborer and was far from being a
wealthy man, he bought the statues on credit.
As far as is known Fred had no
children, and the statues are mostly cenotaphs honoring friends and
relatives, among them family back in New York and in his ancestral
Austria. But none of them were buried here, just Bessie and Fred, who
wrote expressly on one of the gravestones that they did not wish for
anyone else to be buried in the plot, ever.
On December 11, 1938 Frederick
Tanzer died a pauper and still indebted to the stone mason who had
sold him the statues. After his death the masonry company demanded
that the statues be returned, but Greenwood Memorial Park decided to
keep the statues on the gravesite and pay off the amount owing on them. |
