Within this cemetery are countless monuments of exquisite beauty and detail. One might say the cemetery is more art gallery than final resting place. The monument and grave of Henry Charles Lea is one of the more unique sculptures to be found here in this cemetery. Within the burial area are for graves and in the center is the sculpture. The sculpture is a woman seated with a large closed book held to her chest. Perhaps the book represents Lea's life as a historian.
About the Man
Henry Charles Lea (September 19, 1825 - October 24, 1909) was an American historian, civic reformer, and political activist. Lea was born and lived in Philadelphia.
Henry Charles Lea was outspoken on issues involving public projects and public health in Philadelphia. He strongly opposed the building of City Hall at the Penn Square location at the intersection of Broad Street and Market Street (then known as High Street) where it now stands, preferring instead that it be built in Washington Square, near Independence Hall. Lea believed that the project cost too much, and he was angered by the political corruption involved in the awarding of contracts and purchase of building materials for the project. Lea planned and held a large public meeting to recruit support for his alternative to the Penn Square project.
Along with other politically active citizens he filed a lawsuit in 1884 opposing the building of a large slaughterhouse on the Schuylkill River at Thirtieth and Spruce streets on land owned by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, citing the pollution of the river, the stench, and devaluation of properties near the plant. He opposed the construction of the Market Street elevated train, over properties he owned on Market Street. He also opposed building the "boulevard" from City Hall northwest to Fairmount Park, where the Philadelphia Museum of Art was later built.
Lea was chosen president of the National Republican League in 1880 and was president of the Association of Republicans and Independents in 1885. In 1891 he helped found "The Reform Political League of Pennsylvania", with Herbert Welsh as president, Henry C. Lea and Justus C. Strawbridge as vice-presidents, and Charles E. Richardson, secretary.
Lea became a member of the newly-formed American Historical Society and contributed a number of articles to its publication, American Historical Review. Lea was elected president of the American Historical Society in 1903. When the second annual meeting of the newly-formed American Folklore Society was held in Philadelphia in 1889, Lea met with some of the founders, sent an article for publication in the Society's journal, and became the first life-member of the organization.
SOURCE
The following excerpts come from the Smithsonian inventory page for this sculpture.
SOURCE
Inscription
"(Front behind figure:) HENRY/CHARLES/LEA VERITATEV/HISTORY (...transcription illegible)."
Description
"The figure of Cleo, sitting in an architectural frame, looking down. She is holding a large book up on her lap."
Remarks
"Zantzinger and Borie did the frame around Calder's figure of Cleo."
A well-respected historian and political activist, Henry Charles Lea (1825–1909) rests below a monument adorned with the figure of Clio, the muse of history. The bronze figure is the work of the second of the Calders, Alexander Stirling Calder, who throughout a long career contributed enormously to Philadelphia's public sculpture. The tomb's granite backdrop, over seven feet high, forms part of a retaining wall on a picturesque hillside above Kelly Drive. This classical stone structure, which provides an austere setting for Calder's sculpture, was designed by the firm of C. C. Zantzinger and C. Louis Borie, Jr., who later collaborated on the Fidelity Mutual Building and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. SOURCE