Things Change and Stay the Same
While wandering through Lincoln Park on a sunny, Spring day we stumbled upon an old
mausoleum that has kept Chicagoans and tourists puzzled for decades.
The Couch family mausoleum has been sitting on this plot of land since 1857, and Ira
Couch became its first occupant in 1858. At that time it sat among the remains and grave markers of other city inhabitants in the Chicago City Cemetery.
The city was changing and growing, and the living citizenry no longer wanted the dead
and their decaying flesh so close to their new residential neighborhoods. By 1869, the State Legislature decreed that all the deceased, along with their assorted grave markers, must be removed and relocated. Somehow the Couch family remained and no one is certain how this happened.
I remembered a forlorn looking tomb, surrounded by a rusting, collapsing chain link fence
which held back an unruly, overgrown shrubbery of some sort, that almost completely buried the structure in green leaves during the Spring and Summer months.
But, I see change has come to the old mausoleum once again. A new fence, which
replicates the original one has been installed, the overgrowth has been removed, and architectural lighting has been hidden in the ground. Today not one, but two, historical markers tell the mausoleum's story, so no one is left puzzled by the incongruous sight. They kind of take the mystery away too.
Change is inevitable, and Chicago has changed immensely since I left 13 years ago.
For the one, two or thirteen members of the Couch family resting in their final home, the miles of ground surrounding them has been transformed beyond recognition, but their limestone mausoleum remains exactly the same.
Posted by designslinger at 5/7/2009 4:28 AM 
Categories: Cities, Ephemera, History
Tags: Chicago masoleums Lincoln Park Ira Couch cemeteries
Categories: Cities, Ephemera, History
Tags: Chicago masoleums Lincoln Park Ira Couch cemeteries
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