Richmond’s outer space metal monster band GWAR has announced that there will be an unveiling of a memorial monument to its late lead singer Dave Brockie, aka Oderus Urungus in Hollywood Cemetery at 2 pm on Friday, August 30, which is Brockie’s 56th birthday. A least a few of GWAR’s band members, including Brockie, lived at different points in Oregon Hill.
Lots of stuff happening this weekend, but don’t forget Sunday (Mother’s Day!).
From the Valentine Museum website:
Join us to explore stories of the incredible women interred at Hollywood Cemetery, and celebrate their work as suffragettes, authors, educators humanitarians and more. Learn about the lives these courageous women led, their role in the cemetery’s history, and how they shaped the city of Richmond.
Please note that this tour is 1.5 to 2 miles and involves several inclines. Comfortable shoes and water are recommended.
2:00 pm – 4:00 pm
As with Party For The Planet this past weekend, the Richmond riverfront around Oregon Hill should be pretty busy this coming weekend.
This Friday, public/private partnership, Venture Richmond starts back up their Friday Cheers concert series on Brown’s Island. They are claiming its their 35th season (though it seems like that would have to include time when there were not events on this part of the riverfront). This Friday, Lukas Nelson & Promise of the Real with Landon Elliott will be playing. Their photos are above. Tickets cost $10.
On Saturday, the American Civil War Museum at Tredegar will be holding a celebration in honor of its new building. The Times Dispatch recently had a sneak peak of this $25 million, 29,000-square-foot new museum, which is the result of the merger of two museums: the Museum of the Confederacy and the American Civil War Center at Historic Tredegar. The grand opening will include special guided tours of “A People’s Contest: Struggles for Nation and Freedom in Civil War America” exhibit, walking tours, and artifact encounters with curators. Event also features the hosts of BackStory, eight emerging scholars, and Triple Crossing Brewery, and food trucks.
Schedule highlights:
– 9 a.m.: Ribbon cutting
– 10 a.m., 2 p.m., & 4 p.m.: Cannon firing demonstration by Museum staff
– 10:30 a.m.: Live panel program with the hosts of the podcast, BackStory. (90 minutes)
– 12-4 p.m.: Emerging Scholars lightning talks, sponsored by The Civil War Monitor, also in collaboration with Emerging Civil War. (30 minutes each, beginning every 30 minutes at noon)
– 12-4 p.m.: Beer garden, by Triple Crossing Beer. Food trucks also onsite (TBA).
Cost: Free with Museum admission. Free for members.
And then on Sunday, the Annual Sunday Picnic at Hollywood Cemetery will take place from 1:00pm to 3:30pm. Pack a picnic basket, bring a blanket or chair, and join in for an annual tradition that dates back to the 1800s! Live music will be provided by the Oak Lane Band and UNCOMMON, a contemporary acapella band. An ice cream truck and hotdogs will be on site. Trolley tours will also be provided. The picnic is free to attend, but they do ask for RSVP in advance. Please email nrowe@hollywoodcemetery.org or call (804) 648-8501 to make reservations.
Hopefully, rains will hold off for these events, but the forecast is looking iffy.
The Dogtown Dish recently featured this old photo on their FaceBook feed. Best guess on photo date is 1918.
Yesterday evening, looking over Cherry Street into Hollywood Cemetery. I expect a similar scene today with slight overcast of clouds.
Bob Raynor, a reporter/columnist for the Times Dispatch who is retiring later this month, has written a very personal piece on Hollywood Cemetery. Here is an excerpt:
Reporting is usually best when it’s about small things: verifiable, human, close to home. Humility is essential. But it’s important not to forgo the ordinary miracles hiding all around us. Just be sure to treat them with the respect they deserve.
This year already: a rust-colored moon dims the heavens, if only for a moment, and reveals the shadowless light, suns reduced to sparkling pinpoints. How can we not wonder? And a rushing river, impatient for the sea, foams furiously as it crosses old stones and small dams, fueled by melting mountain snows. Does it sense the brackish muddle that awaits below the fall line? The necessary drift? It seems so. An ancient tributary, after all, wise to the ways.
Some stories are too precious to be written frequently. They require a gentle touch, like a fresh seedling, thirsty and fragile.
They must be approached obliquely, sheltered from lethal doses of certainty. But once told, unleash the soul.
***
They rest among rolling green pastures along the high banks of the James, those good souls who never escape childhood yet testify to the power of grace. The waters below are never still, crashing around boulders and pylons in an endless race to the ocean, and the eternal silence is endlessly broken. A blessing. So this is Richmond’s beating heart. This is Hollywood. No place for the fearful, with its ferocious calm and soft, seeded mounds.
Stone crosses and angels — at once static and moving — stand guard even though they are no longer needed, except as reminders to the living.
You may look away. But there is no escape.
***
Laurel Street neighbor Nina Naruszewicz spotted these deer in Hollywood Cemetery.
Drove past six deer just inside the fence at the northwest corner of Hollywood Cemetery on my way home from work today. Sadly by the time I parked and walked back there they had moved further away, so my photos are not the best. I think four were bucks.
This is not the first time we have seen photos of deer in Hollywood…
Hollywood Cemetery on Cherry Street.
And then this photo, sun coming through a Laurel Street neighbor’s fence:
Today looks like a beautiful Fall day like yesterday…good for the Foundry Market at Tredegar…
Great view from Hollywood Cemetery yesterday (minus coal train and Dominion headquarters, of course)…
But be aware that we have rain moving in later tonight.