Customer Reviews

Graveyard Shift: A Family Historian's Guide to New York City Cemeteries

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

As a volunteer gravestone photographer for the past couple of years, I tend to collect and read books about cemeteries. Sometimes to get an idea of how other people photograph gravestones, or it's a particular area that I would be interested in visiting, or just to see where various people are buried. I like photos and anecdotes particularly. Those make a good cemetery book for me.

This book had none of them. For me, living in Scotland, it's quite hard/expensive to get hold of American cemetery books, and this was bought as a Christmas present. New York is the city people mainly want to visit, and a girl can only dream about the shopping they would do there. Me, I would quite happily dream about photographing various New York cemeteries. But I didn't expect this book to be so dry. It's certainly not something you can read cover to cover. The blurb and photos make it sound and look interesting - the contents as a reviewer said before me, are more like a phone book/encyclopedia. This may be more interesting for people who live/have lived in New York, but reading it from my perspective, I was bitterly disappointed in the amount of cemeteries that have been leveled/built over and that history is lost potentially forever.

There is a good photo on the front cover and small photos on the back cover, but why none inside? Just to break up the text and make it slightly more interesting. Yes, obviously some of the graveyards no longer exist, but those that do, a small black and white photo would be better than nothing.

It may be a useful book for someone who could actually visit the cemeteries, or someone who plans to visit the cemeteries at some point, but for me, alas, I will concentrate on photographing the cemeteries near me.

As a genealogist, this book is invaluable for relatives buried in the NY/NJ/LI area.
Provides locations, when established, brief history, religious affiliation, phone numbers, etc.

This book has so much great information and history. It is sad to read as it tells how so many bodies were move from 1 cemetery to another and then maybe another. We loose track of where a relative is buried, but the book has great resources.

"The Graveyard Shift" serves well as a basic resource for most (though not all) of the cemeteries in New York City. Its accessible entries serve as handy references for those wishing to check out a graveyard of interest. Nevertheless, if this book's scope is wide, its depth is shallow (I've gathered that its longest entry is about a page and a half). Neither should you expect Ms. Inskeep to brood over questions of life and death; she lends information, not self-analysis. Researchers will find her bibliography useful.

This all said, Ms. Inskeep didn't see a need to include photographs, historic or otherwise, of at least a few of the cemeteries she refers to. Pity; as this is a guidebook of sorts some well-placed photos would have, er, livened it up a little.

Terrific, comprehensive resource for the genealogist in the NY/NJ area.
Well written text includes addresses and phone numbers, years of use, and informative history of the local cemeteries.

Amazon has a very good, reliable return system. I needed it for this book. It is as dry as bones! This book is only for people who actually want to see graves in New York City and who are actually there. There are no illustrations or descriptions at all.