{"nrhp_refnum":"72000463","name":"Union Miners Cemetery","other_names":[],"category":"site","location":{"address":"0.5 mi. N of Mount Olive city park","address_restricted":false,"city":"Mount Olive","county":"Macoupin County","state":"IL","lat":39.08115483900008,"lon":-89.73149185099999,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1972-10-18","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Social History"],"significance_levels":["state"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A cemetery of about three acres, one half mile north of the city park in Mt. Olive, Macoupin County, Illinois, divided by an oiled road. Its main feature is a granite monument dedicated in 1936.","why_significant":"The nomination calls it the only union-owned cemetery in the nation. It holds the graves of participants in the early major events of Illinois coal unionism, including victims of the 1898 Virden riot. It is also the burial place of Mary \"Mother\" Jones and the site of annual Miners Day celebrations since 1899.","narrative":"Union Miners Cemetery covers about three acres on both sides of an oiled road half a mile north of the city park in Mt. Olive, Illinois. Its centerpiece is a 22-foot pink granite monument, flanked by two bronze miners and bearing plaques to Mary \"Mother\" Jones, organizer \"General\" Alexander Bradley, men killed in the 1898 Virden riot, and twenty-one martyrs of the Progressive Miners of America. The nomination describes the cemetery as the only union-owned cemetery in the nation. It holds the graves of hundreds of miners and of people involved in early coal unionism in Illinois, including three of the four Mt. Olive miners killed at Virden. Since 1899 it has hosted a Miners Day celebration each October 12. The monument was dedicated in 1936 before a crowd said to number 50,000. The nomination presents the site as an illustration of coal mining as a once common way of life and of unionism's place in American labor history.","period_of_significance":null,"architect_builder":"Monument built by the Progressive Mine Workers of America","architectural_style":null,"criteria":[],"status_note":"Condition rated good, unaltered, on its original site, and in use as a cemetery. Open to the public without restriction.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:55:35.063324-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/23/8935/28893523/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_IL/72000463.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/72000463/48d42f3256-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/72000463/48d42f3256-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"Peter Greenberg","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mother_Jones_and_Martyrs_of_the_Progressive_Miners_of_America_Monument,_Mount_Olive,_Illinois.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Peter Greenberg</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:Mother_Jones_and_Martyrs_of_the_Progressive_Miners_of_America_Monument,_Mount_Olive,_Illinois.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/28893523","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_Miners_Cemetery","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7885850"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/illinois/macoupin-county/union-miners-cemetery-72000463/"}