Follow
Wyoming Cemetery,Melrose, Middlesex County, Massachusetts, 02176 USA:
Wyoming Cemetery was established as Melrose's community cemetery in 1857, on 21 acres of land northeast of Pine Banks Park. Several years later, the cemetery was expanded with purchase of 28 additional acres of farmland, at a cost of $10,000.
Before Wyoming Cemetery was established, many of the city’s first inhabitants were buried in an old burying ground that was located across the street from Melrose City Hall, where the present day Coolidge Apartments are located. In 1891, city officials decided to relocate those remains to Wyoming Cemetery, moving some 432 bodies out of the old burying ground and into the community cemetery, which is located on the southern edge of the city on Lebanon and Sylvan Streets. The bodies that were moved into the cemetery are among the oldest at the facility, according to Hughes, though the identities of several of those residents remain unknown.
By 1949 — after being in operation for about a century — the number of people interred at Wyoming Cemetery stood at 14,695, according to a history provided by the cemetery department.
During the 80s and 90s, city officials allowed the pre-sale of graves in Wyoming Cemetery, meaning that residents were allowed to purchase a grave for themselves or a loved one in advance of the person’s death. That practice was discontinued in the early 2000s, however, when it became clear the pre-sale of graves was creating a deficit in the number of new graves available, according to Hughes.
In 2011, Wyoming Cemetery in Melrose held the remains of some 25,476 souls. At that time the community cemetery was inching closer to reaching full capacity.