A little detour some blocks north from 30th Ave…
The first time I walked past the cemetery at 21st Street and 26th Avenue I didn’t pay it much attention. It looked like a random group of relatively recently-installed tombstones on a patch of grass, behind a mesh fence. The second time I noticed a sign saying “Our Lady of Mount Carmel” cemetery. I presumed that the church doesn’t have its own on-site burial ground so used this one, a few blocks away. This time the tombstones were covered in snow – a double burial.
But I’m always curious about cemeteries so decided to find out a bit more about it. I learned that it’s next to the original site of the church. All of the people buried there are Irish immigrants who died between the 1840s and 1890s. They had moved to Astoria to work in the big houses of the wealthy around 14th Street, in greenhouses and in silk factories. All were Irish, that is, except one, an Italian gardener who worked in the cemetery. More about it here.
