Kensico Cemetery

Kensico Cemetery is a cemetery in Valhalla, Westchester Co., New York, founded in 1889, when many New York City cemeteries were becoming full and rural cemeteries were founded near the railroads which served the city. Initially 250-acres, it was expanded to 600 acres in 1905, and reduced to 461 acres in 1912 when a portion was sold to the neighboring Gate of Heaven Cemetery.

Many entertainment figures of the early nineteenth century were buried here.

British spy Major John André was captured in 1780 in a house located on what is now cemetery ground.

Notable burials include:

• Henri Bendel - fashion designer, famed for the Bendel bonnet
• Paul Bonwit - founder of Bonwit Teller department store
• Evangeline Booth - evangelist, daughter of the founder of the Salvation Army
• Billy Burke - actress who played Glenda the Good in ''The Wizard of Oz
• Paddy Chayefsky - screenwriter, winner of three Academy Awards
• Tommy Dorsey - swing-era trombonist
• Geraldine Farrar - an opera singer who had a considerable popular following
• Fred Friendly - broadcaster
• Lou Gehrig - baseball player who gave his name to Lou Gehrig's disease''
• Danny Kaye - comedic actor
• Sergei Rachmaninoff - composer
• Ayn Rand - author
• David Sarnoff - broadcaster who received the distress call of the Titanic
• Fay Templeton - actress
• Florenz Ziegfeld - producer of the Ziegfeld Follies, husband of Billie Burke

External link

• Kensico Cemetery homepage