Eternal Silence

I like to play this game where I try to find the oldest and newest graves in the cemetery. I can tell you that you are very near some of the oldest now. Ones older than Graceland itself.

This is ‘Eternal Silence’ by renowned sculptor Lorado Taft, but around these parts, many of us simply call it ‘The Statue of Death…’ You can see what I mean. It is believed by some that by staring into its closed matte black eyes long enough, one will see the way of their own demise. Friends before you have left pennies and other offerings here to appease the dark force that lives within the bronze.

The statue marks the burial site of one Dexter Graves, an early settler of Chicago and an example of a person who was previously interred in the first City Cemetery before being transferred here some decades after his death. Yes, it is mere confidence that the man buried under the Statue of Death is named ‘Graves.’ Remember, there’s always something to be discovered beyond the grave… or maybe just behind it.

A brother to this ‘Eternal Silence’ statue can be found on the south side of the city, in the ‘Fountain of Time’ statue at the far west end of the historic Midway Plaisance. That other Taft sculpture also features a hooded ‘statue of death’ or more appropriately ‘father time figure.   

Scoot thirty feet over to your left and you’ll find the low-lying marker for famed architect William Le Baron Jenney who designed the world’s first skyscraper. His Manhattan Building is a National Historic Landmark found in the Printing House Row District in the Loop. The steel-skeleton latticework for which he would become famous is featured on the tombstone. He also was a contributor to the landscape architecture of Graceland Cemetery.

Photo by Mitchell J. Ward, 2021.