All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories #081, part 3

Nathan Dunn was born to Quaker parents in New Jersey. After early financial difficulties and disownment by the Philadelphia Quaker Meeting, he sailed to China around 1818 to rebuild his fortunes. In Canton, he gained respect by avoiding the opium trade and engaged in commerce involving tea, silks, porcelain, and other goods. In 1835 he joined with John Jay Smith and others to form Laurel Hill Cemetery, for which he served as primary financial backer. 

Dunn’s decade-long residence in China allowed him to collect a vast array of authentic Chinese artifacts, reflecting a broader American interest in understanding China beyond commerce. His collection later formed the basis of the Chinese Museum in Philadelphia, opened in 1838, one of the first American institutions dedicated exclusively to Chinese culture. The museum featured thousands of objects, life-size wax figures, dioramas, and detailed exhibits of daily life, religion, and governance in China. Dunn transferred the museum to London in 1842, where it was visited by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Late in life, he was accused of illegal homosexual activity and put on trial for the crime of sodomy. 

From All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories #081, part 2 - released December 3, 2025.

When Laurel Hill Cemetery co-founder John Jay Smith died in 1881 at age 83, he left behind a significant legacy in Philadelphia’s cultural and civic institutions. His obituary highlighted his diverse roles as librarian, editor, cemetery founder, and member of the Society of Friends, as well as his family lineage connected to other notable Philadelphia founders. Other accomplishments included introducing paper made from straw and inventing something that sounds suspiciously like the Book of the Month club a century before the real thing. 

Part 1 of All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories #081: Laurel Hill - In the Beginning

Inspired by the allegory of Old Mortality, Laurel Hill was founded in 1836 by John Jay Smith and other reform-minded citizens as a response to overcrowded urban graveyards and changing attitudes toward death and memorialization. Modeled after rural cemeteries like Paris’s Père Lachaise, Laurel Hill emphasized scenic landscaping, remembrance, and inclusivity for various religious and social groups, although early regulations still reflected social prejudices. The founders established distinctive rules, invested in prominent sculptures and monuments, and promoted the cemetery through “celebrity corpses” and innovative designs by architects such as John Notman. Laurel Hill’s development mirrored broader trends in American burial practices, the rural cemetery movement, and the expansion of non-sectarian spaces for commemoration and education, while also sparking debates about the relationship between beauty, solemnity, and social class in cemetery culture.

All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories #081 for December 1, 2025

Laurel Hill Cemetery was founded in 1835 and opened in 1836 by four men with strikingly different backgrounds, but with a common cause - to give the people of Philadelphia a final resting place worthy of the "Athens of America." 

John Jay Smith was a polymath librarian / horticulturalist who had a rather unpleasant experience in seeking the grave of a recently deceased daughter and vowed to change the way people commemorated their dead.

Nathan Dunn was initially a failed merchant who regained his fortunes in the Chinese trade and became the financial backing for the cemetery corporation.

Benjamin Richards was ex-mayor and a business partner of Smith's who on a trip to Europe was inspired by the revolutionary Pere Lachaise Cemetery in Paris to provide something similar in Philadelphia.

Along the way you will also learn about Sir Walter Scott, varying splinter sects of Christianity like the Swedenborgians, what the Opium Wars were really about, the history and significance of The Library Company of Philadelphia, with a brief look at Chinese male-male love as commemorated in the legend of the Cut Sleeve. 

Lon Jourdet was an All-American footballer who also excelled at basketball. He spent 23 non-consecutive years as coach at Penn and captured more than 200 victories, but he left in 1943 with a bitter taste in his mouth for the University, which has come close to forgetting him. He ended his own life in 1959. 

Biographical Bytes from Bala: Laurel Hill West Stories #050

The sport basket ball started on the day James Naismith nailed 13 rules to a gymnasium door in Springfield Massachusetts. The game spread quickly, especially among college men (and women). University of Pennsylvania was an early adapter, and four Penn grads made their names in basketball.

Ellwood Rutschman was a decent player but found his niche as the first professional basketball referee. He set the standards for fairness and ethics in the sport.

"Kid" Keinath was the Quakers' second coach after serving as captain. He was followed by his good friend "Artie" Kiefaber, namesake of the MVP award.

Lon Jourdet won more games in the 20th century than any other Penn basketball coach and was an inventor of the zone defense. But the game passed him by, and his firing in 1943 left him an embittered man. 

All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories #080, Part 5

Hugh Craig, Jr., was a successful businessman whose life became the Troop, where he served both as treasurer and as quartermaster. The men loved him, and they still hold a "Hughie's Breakfast" at the conclusion of every deployment. 

All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories #080, Part 4

Joseph Lapsley Wilson is better remembered today for his arboretum than his troop membership. It still exists today as the Barnes Arboretum at St. Joseph's University. He introduced several species of Asian trees to the United States. His portrait by Thomas Eakins hangs in the Armory Museum. 

All Bones Considered: Laurel Hill Stories #080, part 3

Archibald Loudon Snowden was a polymath who served as Captain of the Troop, as well as postmaster for the city, supervisor of the Philadelphia mint, ambassador to Spain, along with numerous other roles. His portrait is in the armory dining room, and his descendants entertain millions of people. 

All Bones Considered #080, Laurel Hill Stories, part 2

Fairman Rogers lived a life of elegant wealth, but made himself useful as an expert in many aspects of science, especially civil engineering. He was elected briefly as captain of the Troop. He also excelled was as a coachman, especially when he took his magnificent black and red four-in-hand through Fairmount Park. Philadelphia artist Thomas Eakins captured Rogers in a painting that is the first to accurately demonstrate motion in animals.