Post by Mongorne on Feb 3, 2013 11:43:06 GMT -8
Pioneer Park, or it's former name, Calvary Cemetery, is still in use today as a park. in 1967 the city of an Diego declared the cemetery abandoned because it had been 5 years since the last burial. Once the site was declared abandoned they were allowed to do whatever they wished with the site and the community of Hillcrest/Mission Hills was pressing them for a meeting place such as a park.
The headstones were removed from the cemetery and moved to Mount hope Cemetery. The bodies were left interred in the ground where they rested previously, but the headstones that were moved were not placed back into the ground, but thrown into a ravine behind the Mount Hope Cemetery.
The headstones would still be there today if it were not for some passengers on the San Diego Orange Line (After it first opened) who noticed them in the ravine. Outrage broke out and the city replaced some of them. 147 headstones were placed back in a memorial at Pioneer Parks Southeastern end of the park (5% of the total amount of people buried there) and approximately 20 were placed at Mount Hope Cemetery as a memorial. Now what happened to the remainder of the headstones? There was a mass grave dug for the headstones beneath the memorial at Mount Hope Cemetery.
Attached are three pictures. One shows the area in pioneer park where the Memorial is, One shows the layout of the graves superimposed over the current Pioneer Park layout, and the other is of the memorial in Mount Hope Cemetery.
Pioneer park is open 24 hours a day 7 days a week.
Address: 1521 Washington Pl
San Diego, CA 92101
Neighborhood: Mission Hills
Mount Hope Cemetery is open from Dawn till Dusk 7 days a week.
Address: 3751 Market St
San Diego, CA 92102
Neither site has any associated costs.
The headstones were removed from the cemetery and moved to Mount hope Cemetery. The bodies were left interred in the ground where they rested previously, but the headstones that were moved were not placed back into the ground, but thrown into a ravine behind the Mount Hope Cemetery.
The headstones would still be there today if it were not for some passengers on the San Diego Orange Line (After it first opened) who noticed them in the ravine. Outrage broke out and the city replaced some of them. 147 headstones were placed back in a memorial at Pioneer Parks Southeastern end of the park (5% of the total amount of people buried there) and approximately 20 were placed at Mount Hope Cemetery as a memorial. Now what happened to the remainder of the headstones? There was a mass grave dug for the headstones beneath the memorial at Mount Hope Cemetery.
Attached are three pictures. One shows the area in pioneer park where the Memorial is, One shows the layout of the graves superimposed over the current Pioneer Park layout, and the other is of the memorial in Mount Hope Cemetery.
Pioneer park is open 24 hours a day 7 days a week.
Address: 1521 Washington Pl
San Diego, CA 92101
Neighborhood: Mission Hills
Mount Hope Cemetery is open from Dawn till Dusk 7 days a week.
Address: 3751 Market St
San Diego, CA 92102
Neither site has any associated costs.