{"nrhp_refnum":"01000597","name":"Lake Forest Cemetery","other_names":["Evergreen Cemetery","Forest Cemetery"],"category":"district","location":{"address":"1525 N. Lake Rd.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Lake Forest","county":"Lake County","state":"IL","lat":42.26311980250006,"lon":-87.83111904274011,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"2001-05-30","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Landscape Architecture","Art","Architecture"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A roughly 23-acre municipal cemetery on the bluffs above Lake Michigan at 1525 North Lake Road, Lake Forest, Illinois, laid out from 1857 and redesigned in 1901 by landscape architect Ossian Cole Simonds.","why_significant":"The nomination argues the cemetery is a well-preserved landscape designed in the Prairie Style of Landscape Gardening by Ossian Cole Simonds, building on earlier work by Almerin Hotchkiss and William Le Baron Jenney. It keeps its curving roads, open spaces and mature trees, along with notable mausoleums and the 1919 Barrell Memorial Gate. It is described as a leading example of Simonds' cemetery work.","narrative":"Lake Forest Cemetery occupies about 23 acres on the bluffs above Lake Michigan, on the northern edge of Lake Forest, Illinois. Almerin Hotchkiss chose the site in 1857 for its rolling ground, ravines and lake views. William Le Baron Jenney revised the plat in 1882 and set out the road system still in use. In 1900-1901 Ossian Cole Simonds redesigned the grounds in the Prairie Style of Landscape Gardening, with graded open spaces, sunlit clearings, enclosing plantings and framed views. At least 50 trees from his early plantings remain. The cemetery also holds 17 contributing structures and 131 contributing objects. These include the 1919 Barrell Memorial Gate of gray limestone with wrought iron work, private granite mausoleums built between about 1906 and 1934, a columbarium and a white marble Roman-style funerary temple. The cemetery is still active and keeps the quiet, park-like character that Simonds created.","period_of_significance":null,"architect_builder":"Almerin Hotchkiss (site selection, 1857); William Le Baron Jenney (1882 plat and roads); Ossian Cole Simonds (1901 landscape design)","architectural_style":"Gothic Revival, Classical Revival, Art Deco; landscape in the Prairie Style of Landscape Gardening","criteria":[],"status_note":"Still in use as a cemetery, with about 7,000 full burials and 4,000 cremain burials; the city's cemetery commission maintains the historic trees.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:55:37.563075-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/82/8933/28893382/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_IL/01000597.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/01000597/5f888fe3e3-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/01000597/5f888fe3e3-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"Teemu08","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Barrell_Memorial_Gate.JPG\" rel=\"noopener\">Teemu08</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Barrell_Memorial_Gate.JPG"},"district":{"nrhp_refnum":"78001161","name":"Lake Forest Historic District","url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/districts/illinois/lake-forest-historic-district-78001161/"},"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/28893382","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Forest_Cemetery","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q16931884"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/illinois/lake-county/lake-forest-cemetery-01000597/"}