Congressional Cemetery News

The latest news, announcements and updates for Historic Congressional Cemetery

Dust to Dust: A Guide to Green Burials at Congressional Cemetery Part Four

Over the course of the next few weeks, Congressional Cemetery will be sharing information about green burials and the funeral industry’s role in the sustainability movement. The fourth section, Part Four, discusses vegetation and pest management. Vegetation and Pest Management Aerating the soil after digging a grave and the nutrients released through the decomposition of [...]

2019-07-26T13:06:35-04:00October 26th, 2017|

Dust to Dust: A Guide to Green Burials at Congressional Cemetery Part Three

Over the course of the next few weeks, Congressional Cemetery will be sharing information about green burials and the funeral industry’s role in the sustainability movement. The third section, Part Three, focuses on burial containers. Burial Containers  One character defining feature of green burials includes the use of biodegradable caskets, urns, and shrouds. These can [...]

2019-07-26T13:04:31-04:00October 19th, 2017|

Dust to Dust: A Guide to Green Burials at Congressional Cemetery Part Two

Over the course of the next few weeks, Congressional Cemetery will be sharing information about green burials and the funeral industry’s role in the sustainability movement. The second section, Part Two, focuses on embalming and preserving a corpse. Preserving a Corpse/Embalming Embalming is used as a way for a corpse to be prepared by chemicals [...]

2019-07-26T13:03:21-04:00October 12th, 2017|

Dust to Dust: A Guide to Green Burials at Congressional Cemetery Part One

Over the course of the next few weeks, Congressional Cemetery will be sharing information about green burials and the funeral industry's role in the sustainability movement. The first section, Part One, serves as an introduction to the topic. Each year in the United States, 22,500 traditional cemeteries put the following into the ground: 827,060 gallons [...]

2019-07-26T13:02:28-04:00October 5th, 2017|

Adopt-a-Plot Program at Congressional Cemetery

The Adopt-a-Plot Program plays a key role in the preservation and beautification of Congressional Cemetery. Our program provides individuals, groups, organizations, and companies with the opportunity to play an important and active role in preserving, enhancing, and maintaining Congressional Cemetery’s landscape and grounds. The objective of our Adopt-a-Plot program to get members of the local [...]

2022-03-04T09:47:22-05:00September 21st, 2017|

A Runner’s Perspective: Dead Man’s Run

We could go on and on about why you should run Dead Man's Run, a race which is now in its SEVENTH year. Caps lock because we can't believe it either. But if you won't take our word for it, we hope you listen to one of our veteran runners, Catherine Collins. She's been running [...]

2019-07-26T12:44:55-04:00September 7th, 2017|

Not Written in Stone or Bone

The staff here often refer to cemeteries as outdoor museums. Our “collection” on the grounds consists of over 14,000 headstones, each one in need of proper care and conservation, and each one has a written story to tell. Some stories are more detailed than others, but every headstone is a historical record that memorializes the [...]

2019-07-26T12:36:23-04:00August 10th, 2017|

Adam Gurowski: A Polish Eccentric and Lincoln’s Intellectual Foe

When President Abraham Lincoln told his bodyguard about whom he feared potentially assassinating him the most, it wasn’t the disgruntled, Confederate-sympathizing actor John Wilkes Booth. Rather, it was a somewhat bizarre Polish man who had renounced his old citizenship, became a spokesman for tsarist autocracy in Russia, and ultimately moved to the United States and [...]

2019-07-26T12:31:16-04:00July 27th, 2017|

And You Thought I Was Done with Introductions: Meet Our New Grounds Conservation Manager, Kymberly Mattern

Now that our previous Grounds Conservation Manager, Daniel Holcombe, has moved on to a new job, it’s time to welcome our new one, Kymberly Mattern! This Northern Virginia native recently moved back to the region upon completing her graduate studies. She studied History and Women’s and Gender Studies at Juniata College, which she described as [...]

2019-07-26T12:27:44-04:00July 13th, 2017|
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