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The cemetery is municipally owned and has achieved notoriety by being proclaimed as one of the largest cemeteries in the country.
Established in the mid 1800s as a privately owned cemetery, it was then sold to the City of Lynn in 1850. It boasts a variety of historically significant features and landmarks and it has been said that the burial ground, rich in history, is home to prominent artists, inventors, political leaders and even paupers.
The cemetery consists of approximately 250 developed acres which have been recorded in Ripley's Believe It or Not as the "second longest contiguous stone wall in the world", second only to the Great Wall of China. The wall is built of fieldstone and was built by the WPA in the 1930s. The cemetery houses between 88,000 and 90,000 interments.
Pine Grove Cemetery is a cemetery whose main entrance is on Boston Street in Lynn, Essex County, Massachusetts. It was established in the mid-19th century and it consists of 82 developed acres. There are approximately 88,000 to 90,000 interments at the cemetery.
It was originally established as a private cemetery in 1849, with a design by Henry A. S. Dearborn, noted designer of Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was purchased by the city of Lynn in 1855. In 1930, a wall was built by the WPA to surround the cemetery, and according to Ripley's Believe It or Not! it is the “second-longest contiguous stone wall in the world,” second only to the Great Wall of China . The cemetery got its name from the plethora of pine trees surrounding Rhodes Memorial Chapel and the cemetery's entrance. The cemetery was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2014.
Pine Grove Cemetery has many notable features and landmarks:
- The cemetery office building, erected in 1860.
- The Pine Grove Cemetery Receiving Tomb, constructed from 1866 to 1868. Built in a Ruskinian Gothic style, it was part of a building campaign following the Civil War. It is made of granite ashlar construction with a cast iron doorway.
- The Rhodes Memorial Chapel, built in 1891. It was built using a donation from a Ms. Amos Rhodes in a Richardsonian Romanesque style. The stained glass windows are valued at over $10,000.
- The Cemetery's greenhouse, whose operations have been noted throughout the country.