Exhibitions and Sculptures

JOHN R. ROBBINS MONUMENT Proceed along Pine Avenue; take a left onto Warren Avenue. A little ways down, on your left, cross the grass on Grape Path to a monument of a woman leaning on a pedestal with an urn; this is the JOHN R. ROBBINS monument. Who was John R. Robbins? Boston city directories indicate that in the nineteenth century, Robbins owned and operated a “bowling saloon” on Washington and Sudbury Streets. Robbins probably bought the lot at Forest Hills when his first wife died; two children who had died several years before were also moved to Forest Hills at that time. Robbins buried quite a few of his family members, including his second wife and a 15-year old son. He died in 1897 at the age of 84, of what was called “exhaustion.” This monument, like the Sumner monument, was likely another off-the-shelf piece also imported from Italy, although we can’t be certain. Books full of possible monument designs were available to clients, who like today could choose something they liked or felt was appropriate. The motifs Mr. Robbins chose would have been very familiar from the study of classical civilization, literature and mythology, which was an important part of one’s formal education. The figure of the mourning or weeping woman, dressed in Greek-style robes, is an allegorical figure, that is, an embodiment of an abstract concept. Allegorical figures have been classified in books for architects and architects, along with their “attributes,” or symbols, since at least the Renaissance; allegorical figures show up all over the Cemetery. This particular mourning figure is almost called “Grief”; Grief always leans next to or near a funerary urn. The funerary urn is another reference to classical Greece, where urns held the ashes of the deceased. Versions of Grief were extremely popular in the Early Republic period (1780-1830), when they reproduced as tabletop ceramics, by young girls as needlework pictures, especially when someone famous died, like George Washington. When Mr. Robbins chose this monument, Grief and her urn was a well-known mourning image in nineteenth century popular culture. Notice also other elements that you will see repeated elsewhere at Forest Hills, including the inverted torch that indicates the “snuffing out” of life, and the flame at the top of the urn, which refers to eternal life or resurrection. The winged hourglass refers to the passage of time. Robbins also wanted to make sure that people knew he and his family were good Christians; the Biblical inscription “I am the Resurrection and the Life” on the face is the same as that on the Cemetery entrance gates. This monument was considered very fashionable in its early days; an engraving of it was included in the 1858 guidebook of Forest Hills showing notable or beautiful monuments. While you are still at the Robbins monument, as you stand facing the monument look to your right and you will see its’ counterpart about 40 years later, even though it looks different. The Randidge monument of about 1891 was executed by sculptor Adolph Robert Kraus, with the base designed by architect Carl Fehmer. Even though the Randidge monument is much larger in scale than the Robbins monument, the elements are essentially the same, and express the same feelings: the figure of Grief in classical robes leans in sorrow on an inverted torch; funerary urns decorate the four corners of the base. The different materials used—bronze, granite—show the changes in the fields of sculpture and monument making that had taken place in the late nineteenth century, when Paris and the Beaux-Arts (“beautiful arts”) school had replaced Italy as the center of the art world, and when bronze and granite also replaced marble as the dominant sculptural materials.

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