Graceland Cemetery and DePaul University are collaborating on projects to educate visitors about the 164-year-old cemetery’s history. Funded by a grant exceeding $198,000 from the Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelley Foundation, DePaul faculty and students will create digital audio tours and exhibits in Graceland’s visitor center. These projects aim to highlight both famous and lesser-known monuments on Chicago's North Side.

"The Donnelley Foundation understands that Graceland is a repository of hidden stories, both in their headstones and the documents they contain," said Jane Baxter, assistant professor of anthropology at DePaul. "This project can develop tools to help people connect deeper with those stories and enrich their experiences at Graceland."

Baxter designed the two-year collaboration with Graceland to support community-engaged, project-based learning opportunities. DePaul faculty will propose courses focusing on Graceland's unique archival collections from specific disciplinary angles. Each class will culminate in public-facing projects such as audio tours or exhibits.

DePaul alumna Misha Mikami is curating the first exhibit on Inez Clarke, a child who passed away in 1880 and is central to many ghost stories. Mikami earned her bachelor’s degree in anthropology from DePaul and is currently an intern at Graceland. She will present on Clarke’s life and the items left at her grave during the project launch event titled “Offerings: A Year of Visitation to Inez Briggs” on Saturday, Sept. 28 at 1 p.m., located at 4001 N. Clark St., Chicago.

"People come to Graceland to see massive and famous monuments, including Inez, but there are also a lot of overlooked graves like her family right next to her," said Mikami. "There are so many interesting stories that build a grander narrative about what it meant to be a Chicagoan back then and what that says about Chicago today."

Baxter will also speak at the launch event about commemorating children in American cemeteries. An expert on the archaeology of childhood, she emphasizes that cemeteries serve both living people and those who have passed away.

"Cemeteries were originally intended also as parks for living people, but we’ve lost many reasons to visit cemeteries," Baxter said. "People are living longer, moving away from where their loved ones are buried or consider cemeteries scary and unwelcoming." Baxter noted a resurgence in popularity during COVID-19 as people sought outdoor spaces or explored family histories.

Each visitor center exhibit will use archives from Graceland’s collection, sharing hidden stories that visitors may not discover independently. Existing paper tour guides will be digitized for easier exploration of the grounds.

"We have been so impressed by the energy, passion, care, and fresh perspective that our research intern Misha has brought to our organization," said Stephanie Sloane, director of Graceland Cemetery. "We are deeply grateful for our deepening relationship with DePaul thanks to support from the Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelley Foundation."

At the event, Mikami will launch a blog sharing her research online about Briggs’ true story. She will also present her research at the American Anthropological Association Annual Meeting in November.

The Sept. 28 event is free and open to the public; registration is encouraged via Eventbrite.

To learn more about Graceland Cemetery, visit their website.

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