★★★★★ 5.0
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The Green-Wood Cemetery
580,000 people live here permanently... and they're ALL dead! You're standing on America's most famous cemetery that started as a Revolutionary War battlefield on August 27, 1776. This 478-acre wonderland was once Brooklyn's highest point where colonial soldiers fought the LARGEST battle of the entire war. By the 1860s, more people visited here than Niagara Falls! Look up at Battle Hill - that statue of Minerva is actually waving at the Statue of Liberty across the harbor. Pretty cool neighbors for a graveyard, right?
Did You Know?
- Green-Wood Cemetery was once one of the most popular tourist attractions in the United States—even rivaling Niagara Falls in the mid-19th century, drawing 50,000 visitors a year who came to enjoy its scenic beauty, carriage rides, and impressive sculptures, and its popularity directly inspired the creation of New York City’s great parks like Central Park and Prospect Park.
- Designed by landscape architect David Bates Douglass in 1838, Green-Wood was one of America’s first rural cemeteries, pioneering the idea that cemeteries could be beautiful, park-like spaces for both the living and the dead; Douglass crafted over 40 miles of winding pathways that highlight the natural landscape, and his work here influenced the design of other major cemeteries across the country.
- The cemetery grounds were the site of the pivotal Battle of Long Island (also known as the Battle of Brooklyn) during the American Revolution in 1776, making Green-Wood not just a resting place for notable figures like Leonard Bernstein, Boss Tweed, and Jean-Michel Basquiat, but also a landmark of national historical significance where you can literally walk on Revolutionary War battlegrounds.