For more than a century, it was almost impossible to find out much about people buried on Hart Island. But in 2008, that all changed — thanks in large part to a woman named Melinda Hunt. 
 
Melinda is a visual artist who has spent more than 30 years documenting America’s largest public cemetery, and advocating for families with loved ones buried there. She is the founder of <a href="https://www.hartisland.net/" title="Hart Island Project" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">The Hart Island Project</a>, a searchable database of more than 75,000 burial records. 
 
This week, producer Alissa Escarce sits down with Melinda to discuss the history of Hart Island and how it’s changed over the last few decades. This is episode four of our series The Unmarked Graveyard. New episodes published each week.

For more than a century, it was almost impossible to find out much about people buried on Hart Island. But in 2008, that all changed — thanks in large part to a woman named Melinda Hunt. Melinda is a visual artist who has spent more than 30 years documenting America’s largest public cemetery, and advocating for families with loved ones buried there. She is the founder of The Hart Island Project, a searchable database of more than 75,000 burial records. This week, producer Alissa Escarce sits down with Melinda to discuss the history of Hart Island and how it’s changed over the last few decades. This is episode four of our series The Unmarked Graveyard. New episodes published each week.

For more than a century, it was almost impossible to find out much about people buried on Hart Island. But in 2008, that all changed — thanks in large part to a woman named Melinda Hunt. 
 
Melinda is a visual artist who has spent more than 30 years documenting America’s largest public cemetery, and advocating for families with loved ones buried there. She is the founder of <a href="https://www.hartisland.net/" title="Hart Island Project" rel="noopener noreferrer">The Hart Island Project</a>, a searchable database of more than 75,000 burial records. 
 
This week, producer Alissa Escarce sits down with Melinda to discuss the history of Hart Island and how it’s changed over the last few decades. This is episode four of our series The Unmarked Graveyard. New episodes published each week.

The Unmarked Graveyard: Documenting an Invisible Island

Hart Island, an uninhabited strip of land off the Bronx, is America’s largest public cemetery, sometimes known as a “potter’s field.” Since 1869, more than a million people have been buried on Hart Island, including early AIDS patients, unidentified and unclaimed New Yorkers, immigrants, incarcerated people, artists, and about ten percent of New Yorkers who died of COVID-19. Many people buried there are shrouded in anonymity. The island has no headstones or plaques, just numbered markers. Simple pine coffins are stacked in mass graves. In many cases, explanations for how bodies came to be buried there are hard to find.\
\
Our series tells the stories of seven people buried on Hart Island through a range of circumstances. Some were lost in the system after their deaths, while others had been cut off from family and friends for years. One chose Hart Island as his final resting place. Each story is told by the people who knew them best, some of whom overcame tremendous obstacles to uncover what happened to their loved ones.

Society & Culture

Documentary

Hart Island, an uninhabited strip of land off the Bronx, is America’s largest public cemetery, sometimes known as a “potter’s field.” Since 1869, more than a million people have been buried on Hart Island, including early AIDS patients, unidentified and unclaimed New Yorkers, immigrants, incarcerated people, artists, and about ten percent of New Yorkers who died of COVID-19. Many people buried there are shrouded in anonymity. The island has no headstones or plaques, just numbered markers. Simple pine coffins are stacked in mass graves. In many cases, explanations for how bodies came to be buried there are hard to find.\ \ Our series tells the stories of seven people buried on Hart Island through a range of circumstances. Some were lost in the system after their deaths, while others had been cut off from family and friends for years. One chose Hart Island as his final resting place. Each story is told by the people who knew them best, some of whom overcame tremendous obstacles to uncover what happened to their loved ones.

Hart Island, an uninhabited strip of land off the Bronx, is America’s largest public cemetery, sometimes known as a “potter’s field.” Since 1869, more than a million people have been buried on Hart Island, including early AIDS patients, unidentified and unclaimed New Yorkers, immigrants, incarcerated people, artists, and about ten percent of New Yorkers who died of COVID-19.&nbsp;Many people buried there are shrouded in anonymity. The island has no headstones or plaques, just numbered markers. Simple pine coffins are stacked in mass graves. In many cases, explanations for how bodies came to be buried there are hard to find.\
\
Our series tells the stories of seven people buried on Hart Island through a range of circumstances. Some were lost in the system after their deaths, while others had been cut off from family and friends for years. One chose Hart Island as his final resting place. Each story is told by the people who knew them best, some of whom overcame tremendous obstacles to uncover what happened to their loved ones.

Share The Unmarked Graveyard: Documenting an Invisible Island

Sign up to save your podcasts

The Unmarked Graveyard: Documenting an Invisible Island

The Unmarked Graveyard: Documenting an Invisible Island

More shows like The Unmarked Graveyard: Stories from Hart Island

This American Life

Radiolab

Planet Money

Criminal

The Heart

The Truth

History Extra podcast

Radio Diaries

Rumble Strip

The West Wing Weekly

Pod Save America

The Daily

Everything is Alive

Throughline

Buried Bones - a historical true crime podcast with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes

Articles of Interest

Over the Road

Home Cooking

The Last Archive

Anatomy of Murder

Maintenance Phase

The Ezra Klein Show

Normal Gossip

You Get A Podcast!

Hang Up

The Recipe with Kenji and Deb

Never Post

Proxy with Yowei Shaw

Do I have ADHD? | mental health, procrastination, organization, overstimulated, focus, ADHD mom

My Mother Made Me

Shocking, Heartbreaking, Transformative

Not All Propaganda Is Art

Ways of Hearing

Secrets