Text of the Marker:
Mount Mora Cemetery
On April 1, 1846, Simeon Kemper obtained a United States government patent for one hundred sixty acres at $1.25 per acre. Four years later, Kemper took two partners, Israel Landis and Reuben Middleton, who paid him almost $200 per acre for their share of 20 acres destined to become a cemetery. On February 22, 1851, the men received approval of the Articles of Incorporation for Mount Mora Cemetery; four days later, they placed this advertisement in The Saint Joseph Weekly Gazette:
"To the Public - the undersigned having purchased a lot of ground on the North West Corner of Mr. S. Kemper's farm within one mile of the Court house, propose fiting it up as a cemetry provided sufficient encouragement is given to the undertaking by the citizens of St.Joseph. It is our intention to lay it off in Blocks and Lots of all sizes, so as to suit purchasers. The ground will be enclosed in a short time with a good substantial board fence, and otherwise improved."
In 1873, W. Angelo Powell laid out Mount Mora Cemetery for $5,000. Powell, a prominent architect of the time, used the Rural Garden Cemetery design for Mount Mora. This form, new to the United States in 1831, is replicated in the cemetery's planned landscaping, magnificent mausoleums, aesthetic design of Mausoleum Row, and curvilinear roads following the natural contours of the land.
Giants of Saint Joseph commerce and industry, three Missouri governors, veterans of multiple wars, Pony Express riders, an English baronet, and individuals who strongly influenced the Western Movement of the United States of America are among the thousands buried here.
Erected August 2004.
From the National Register application:
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"Mount Mora Cemetery, 824 Mount Mora Rd., St. Joseph, MO is a 20 acre cemetery established in 1851. Redesigned in 1872 by W. Angelo Powell, the commercial cemetery is an example of the rural garden cemetery movement in landscape architecture. The 20 original acres in the cemetery are surrounded by a stone retaining wall and iron fencing, and grand wrought iron gates welcome visitors and mourners onto the property. The streets and pathways are laid out in a curvilinear pattern and provide access to the hundreds of historic graves and markers. Though an estimated 15,000 people are buried in the cemetery, only approximately 8,845 have some kind of marker. The grave markers are predominantly limestone and granite, though marble and metal markers are also common. The many large trees including cedars, pines, black walnuts on the rolling hills of this old cemetery date to the 1934 landscaping and enhance the cemetery's park-like setting. There are new plantings around the two war memorials. The property contains 37 contributing resources including the superintendent's house, barn and workshop, 30 mausoleums, World War I Memorial, Confederate Civil War Memorial, the entrance gate and retaining wall, and the site itself. The majority of burials occurred in the cemetery between 1851 and around 1930."