Bayside Cemetery

I came across Bayside Cemetery recently in some corner of the Internet, where it was mentioned that the Queens cemetery had fallen into disrepair to the point where people were complaining about exposed human remains. This information was somewhat outdated, and the cemetery has since been cleaned up a bit, but I still thought it was worth visiting so my friend Tag and I went to check it out recently on a partly gloomy Sunday morning.

Abandoned (or abandoned-ish) cemeteries are touchy things—on the one hand, I love anything creepy, crumbling and overgrown, but on the other hand I can understand why family members would be upset to see the final resting places of their loved ones fall into disrepair. I think everyone deserves a dignified end (and eternal resting place, if that's your thing), but I haven't come across many cemeteries that aren't very well tended to, so the minute we stepped into Bayside it felt special.

Bayside—along with neighboring Acacia and Mokom Sholom cemeteries—was founded in Queens in 1865, and is one of the oldest still-active Jewish cemeteries in the city. Cemetery residents include multiple Civil War veterans and one victim from the Titanic. Most of the graves are quite old, but we did eventually find some from the 90s and 2000s.

Some areas of the cemetery were more tended to than others, and I can see how it probably used to be a lot worse. A lot of the mausoleums were boarded, bricked or cemented shut, while some had doors that swung open freely. We didn't come across any graffiti or noticeable vandalism, but a lot of stones had fallen off their pedestals or had been broken by trees and covered with leaves, fallen branches and ivy. The main office was boarded up and obviously hadn't been in use for a while, but we did see two men tending to the grounds as we were leaving, and the gate was open for visitors.

I lost count of how many times I exclaimed how much I loved Bayside during our time walking through the overgrown weeds, and I wouldn't hesitate to declare it one of my very favorite places in the city. I bet it's incredible in the snow or in the fall and I already started dreaming about my return before we had even left.