Incorporated in 1841 and consecrated in 1844, the Albany Rural Cemetery was founded as a response to the deteriorating condition of old city burying grounds. The grounds of the new Cemetery were laid out by Major David Bates Douglass, the landscape engineer who had previously designed Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn. Miles of carriage roads and paths wound through hills, glades, woods, and ravines giving visitors a chance to admire the scenery and potential plots to purchase. The first burials took place in May 1845 with the reinterment of Isabella Strain,…
