CHRISTIAN GOBRECHT GRAVE MARKER UNVEILING

 

Christian Gobrecht Grave Marker Unveiling

Christian Gobrecht, third Engraver of the United States Mint, died in office on July 23, 1844, and was succeeded by James Barton Longacre. Gobrecht was interred at Philadelphia's Monument Cemetery, at Broad and Berks Streets in North Central Philadelphia. By 1955, the burial grounds were dilapidated. With Temple University and the Philadelphia Board of Education wishing to acquire the land, the courts were petitioned for relocation of the cemetery. The following year, Gobrecht and family members were reinterred at Lawnview Cemetery in Rockledge, PA, a northeast suburb of Philadelphia.

Bill Bugert, in the July 2008 Gobrecht Journal (#102), described the search for the Gobrecht grave, an involved investigation that eventually uncovered a plain marker in the Lawnview location, that reveals simply GOBRECHT. Gobrecht's headstone in 1844 was more fitting to his office, and to Vladimir Clain-Stefanelli goes the credit for preserving an image of the original marker, which Bugert believes was discarded in the 1956 relocation of the remains.

The Liberty Seated Collectors Club, collectors of Gobrecht's Liberty Seated coinage, has sponsored a new marker for the Gobrecht family grave, and an unveiling ceremony will take place this fall. The commemoration will occur at Lawnview Cemetery, 500 Huntington Pike, Rockledge, PA on November 13 at 1 P.M. This is the Wednesday preceding the November Whitman Coin Expo in Baltimore. For further information, contact Dennis Fortier (ricajun@msn.com), Vice-President of the Liberty Seated Collectors Club.

 

Link to July 2008 Gobrecht Journal, including Bill Bugert's article The Search for Christian Gobrecht's Birthplace and Final Resting Place:
https://nnp.wustl.edu/library/book/177

Link to December 2016 E-Gobrecht, including information on the original headstone:
https://nnp.wustl.edu/library/book/523821

For more information on the Liberty Seated Collectors Club, see:
http://www.lsccweb.org/

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