Places not visited

By now, we're out of New England, our home for the last eight years.  Looking back, there are some cool places there that we didn't get to.  The Hope Cemetery in Barre, Vermont is one of those places.  It has headstones like you've never seen:

That's the grave of Mr. and Mrs. William Halvosa, depicted by the granite sculptor as sitting up in bed.  The inscription, from the Song of Solomon, reads:

Set me as a seal upon thine heart for love is strong as death.

The cemetery is unique.  Most of the country's granite stone came from quarries near here, and so the region attracted many talented stonemasons from Europe.  This combination of talent and a single type of stone to work which makes this burying ground sui generis:

Local cemeteries are models of memorial design, with custom figures, bas-reliefs and ornate crypts. The greatest concentration can be found in Barre, where many of the stone carvers and their families are buried.

Hope Cemetery, first opened in 1895, is 85-acres spread across a hillock of well-manicured grass. Despite the variety of memorial design, there is a uniformity not seen in other cemeteries. That's because every one of the 10,000+ monuments is made of Barre Gray granite.

Click through to see headstones shaped like cars, sofa chairs, and soccer balls.  I wish we'd gone, because we probably won't get the chance now.