Riverview Cemetery

Riverview Cemetery was founded in 1872 by a coalition of 18 fraternal lodges of the Knights of Pythias and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. This 42-acre site was the first cemetery outside of Wilmington city limits to be open to people of all socio-economic classes and religious faiths. The original southeast side, designed in a formal grid-plan, is the only known example in Delaware of the work of Hermann J. Schwarzmann, a prominent 19th-century Philadelphia landscape architect. In 1899 the northwest side was designed and laid out in a picturesque serpentine pattern by cemetery superintendent Goldsmith C. Nailor. The large community mausoleum was built in 1917 using a design fromWilliam E. Hughes’ American Mausoleum and Construction Company of Clyde, Ohio. Not only is this the first community mausoleum erected in Delaware, moreover it is the First State’s only known example of Hughes’ patented mausoleum design. Now owned and maintained by the Friends of Historic Riverview Cemetery, Inc., this site is the final resting place for over 36,000 souls. Still in use today, Riverview Cemetery was named to the National Register of Historic Places on July 3, 2012.