From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Main Gate taken in August 2007

One of the many elaborate mausoleums inside the Colon Cemetery, Havana, Cuba

Main cemetery chapel located in the center of the cemetery

The northern main gate of the Colon Cemetery (Cementerio Cristóbal Colón) without the statues which were placed on the top in 1901

The Colon Cemetery or more fully in the Spanish language Cementerio de Cristóbal Colón was founded in 1876 in the Vedado neighbourhood of Havana, Cuba on top of Espada Cemetery. Named for Christopher Columbus, the 140 acre (57 ha) cemetery is noted for its many elaborately sculpted memorials. It is estimated that today the cemetery has more than 500 major mausoleums, chapels, and family vaults.

Colon Cemetery has a 75-foot (23 m)-high monument to the firefighters who lost their lives in the great fire of May 17, 1890. As baseball is a leading sport in Cuba, the cemetery has two monuments to baseball players from the Cuban League. The first was erected in 1942 and the second in 1951 for members of the Cuban Baseball Hall of Fame.

In February 1898, the recovered bodies of sailors who died on the United States Navy battleship Maine were interred in the Colon Cemetery. In December 1899 the bodies were disinterred and brought back to the United States for burial at Arlington National Cemetery. [1]

With more than 800,000 graves, space in the Colon Cemetery is currently at a premium and as such after three years remains are removed from their tombs, boxed and placed in a storage building. A few of the personalities interred here include:

• Santiago Álvarez (1919–1998), filmmaker
• Manuel Arteaga y Betancourt, Roman Catholic Cardinal
• Beatriz Azurduy Palacios (1952–2003), filmmaker
• Hubert de Blanck (1856–1932), composer
• José Raúl Capablanca (1888–1942), world chess champion
• Alejo Carpentier (1904–1980), novelist
• Eduardo Chibás (1907–1951), politician
• Juan Chabás (1910–1954), author
• Ibrahim Ferrer (1927–2005), musician
• José Miguel Gómez (1858–1921), president of Cuba
• Máximo Gómez (1836–1905), Dominican military hero
• Ruben Gonzalez (1919-2003), Cuban Pianist from Buena Vista Social Club
• Nicolás Guillén (1902–1989), poet
• Nicolás Guillén Landrián (1938–2003), Filmmaker and painter
• Tomás Gutiérrez Alea (1928–1996), filmmaker
• Harrison E. Havens (1837–1916), United States Congressman
• Alberto Korda (1928–2001), photographer
• José Lezama Lima (1910–1976), writer, poet
• Dulce María Loynaz (1902–1997), poet, novelist
• Dolf Luque (1890–1957), Major League Baseball starting pitcher
• Mary McCarthy Gomez Cueto (1900–2009), Havana socialite and musician
• Armando Marsans (1887–1960) Major League Baseball outfielder
• William Alexander Morgan (1928–1961), American adventurer
• Fernando Ortiz (1881–1969), ethnomusicologist
• German Pinelli (1907–1996), journalist, actor
• Chano Pozo (1915–1948), musician, pioneer of Afrocuban jazz
• Juan Rius Rivera (1848-1924), Puerto Rican military hero
• Lola Rodríguez de Tió (1848-1924), Puerto Rican poetess.Car

External links

• Panoramic photo of Colon Cemetery

Coordinates: 23°07′23″N 82°23′55″W / 23.12306°N 82.39861°W / 23.12306; -82.39861