Thomas Jefferson University is a private research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Established in its earliest form in 1824, the university officially combined with Philadelphia University in 2017. The university is named for U.S. Founding Father and president Thomas Jefferson. It is classified among "R2: Doctoral Universities – High research activity".
Body snatching is the illicit removal of corpses from graves, morgues, and other burial sites. Body snatching is distinct from the act of grave robbery as grave robbing does not explicitly involve the removal of the corpse, but rather theft from the burial site itself. The term 'body snatching' most commonly refers to the removal and sale of corpses primarily for the purpose of dissection or anatomy lectures in medical schools. The term was coined primarily in regard to cases in the United Kingdom and United States throughout the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. However, there have been cases of body snatching in many countries, with the first recorded case dating back to 1319 in Bologna, Italy.
Grave robbery, tomb robbing, or tomb raiding is the act of uncovering a grave, tomb or crypt to steal commodities. It is usually perpetrated to take and profit from valuable artefacts or personal property. A related act is body snatching, a term denoting the contested or unlawful taking of a body, which can be extended to the unlawful taking of organs alone.
The Philadelphia Press is a defunct newspaper that was published from August 1, 1857, to October 1, 1920.
Philadelphia National Cemetery is a United States National Cemetery located in the West Oak Lane neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was established in 1862 as nine leased lots in seven private cemeteries in the Philadelphia region. The current location was established in 1881, and the remains of soldiers were reinterred from the various leased lots. It is administered by the United States Department of Veterans Affairs, and managed from offices at Washington Crossing National Cemetery. It is 13 acres in size and contains 13,202 burials.
Mount Moriah Cemetery is a historic rural cemetery that spans the border between Southwest Philadelphia and Yeadon, Pennsylvania. It was established in 1855 and is the largest cemetery in Pennsylvania. It is 200 acres in size and contains 150,000 burials. It differed from Philadelphia's other rural cemeteries such as Laurel Hill Cemetery and the Woodlands Cemetery in that it was easily accessible by streetcar; allowed burials of African-Americans, Jews and Muslims; and catered to a more middle-class clientele.
Greenwood Cemetery is a historic cemetery in the Frankford neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. It was established in 1869, is 43 acres in size and contains approximately 20,000 graves.
Eden Cemetery is a historic African-American cemetery located in Collingdale, Pennsylvania. It was established June 20, 1902, and is the oldest existing black owned cemetery in the United States. The cemetery covers about 53 acres and contains approximately 93,000 burials.
Odd Fellows Cemetery was a 32 acre cemetery located North and South of Diamond Street and between 22nd and 25th Street in the North Philadelphia West neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was established in 1849 by the Odd Fellows fraternal organization for the burial of their members. The eighty-one foot high, brown stone, Egyptian Revival gatehouse was designed by architects Stephen Decatur Button and Joseph C. Hoxie.
Lawnview Memorial Park, also referred to as Lawnview Cemetery, is a cemetery located at 500 Huntingdon Pike in Rockledge, Pennsylvania. It is 82 acres (33 ha) in size and is managed by the Odd Fellows Cemetery Company of Philadelphia. It contains the reburial of tens of thousands of bodies from Monument Cemetery and the Odd Fellows Cemetery in Philadelphia after they were closed in the 1950s.
John C. Bowers, Jr. was an African American entrepreneur, organist and vestryman at St. Thomas African Episcopal Church, and a founding member of the first Grand United Order of Odd Fellows for African Americans in Pennsylvania. He was active in the anti-slavery movement in Philadelphia, and involved in the founding of several organizations including the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society. "A fervent abolitionist and outspoken opponent of colonization, [he] was much in demand as a public speaker."
Monument Cemetery was a rural cemetery located at the current day intersection of Broad and Berks Street in North Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from 1837 to 1956. It was the second rural cemetery in Philadelphia after Laurel Hill Cemetery. It was approximately 20 acres in size and contained 28,000 burials. It had a grand gothic gatehouse and a 67-foot high obelisk monument to George Washington and the Marquis de Lafayette designed by John Sartain at the center of the cemetery.
The Pennsylvania Anatomy Act of 1883 is legislation of the State of Pennsylvania to facilitate medical education. This act allowed teachers and students to be able to dissect bodies without have to resort to buying from grave robbers or buying body parts. This act was written to prevent grave robbing, and to even out the availability of corpses.
Jacob C. White Jr. was an American educator, intellectual, and civil rights activist. Born to a successful and influential businessman, White received the finest education afforded to African-Americans of the time and became intertwined in the dealings of Philadelphia's most prominent black leaders. The first black man in the city to be appointed as a school principal at Roberts Vaux Consolidated School. During his tenure between 1864 and 1896, White reformed the institute and became the leading figure in the field of urban education in Philadelphia. Alongside his academic endeavors, White was significant in the sports field: he helped establish the Philadelphia Pythians, an early black baseball club. Following the shooting of his friend and fellow activist Octavius Catto in 1871, White became the top civil rights activist in the city, and remained active in the community until his death in 1902.
Emilie "Emily" Frances Davis was a free African American woman living in Philadelphia during the American Civil War. She wrote three pocket diaries for the years 1863, 1864, and 1865 recounting her perspective on the Emancipation Proclamation, the Battle of Gettysburg, and the mourning of President Lincoln. These diaries are unique in their depiction of 19th century life of urban African American women and reactions to the events of the Civil War.
Mount Vernon Cemetery is a historic rural cemetery located at 3499 West Lehigh Avenue in the East Falls neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was established in 1856, is 27 acres in size and contains over 18,000 graves. It was neglected for decades by an absentee landlord. No plots have been sold since 1968, it was not open to the public, many graves fell into disrepair and the cemetery became heavily overgrown. In 2021, a Philadelphia judge ordered the cemetery be placed in conservatorship due to neglect.
Lafayette Cemetery was a cemetery in the Passyunk Square neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was established in 1828 and originally intended for 14,000 burials but over time fell into disrepair and became overcrowded with 47,000 burials. In 1946, the cemetery was condemned by the city of Philadelphia. The bodies were disinterred in 1947, transported to the Evergreen Memorial Park in Bensalem, Pennsylvania, and reinterred in a mass grave.
