# Lincoln Cemetery (Cook County)

Lincoln Cemetery is a historically African American cemetery in Blue Island, Illinois, United States. The cemetery is about 112 acres (45 ha) with over 16,000 interments.

## History

Founded in 1911 by local Black business leaders, the cemetery is next to the Oak Hill Cemetery. The cemetery is noteworthy for the number of famous African-American Chicagoans buried there, among them several notable blues and jazz musicians, as well as notables in literature, sports, and history.

## Notable graves

* Robert Sengstacke Abbott (1870–1940), newspaper publisher
* Albert Ammons (1907–1949), jazz/boogie-woogie pianist
* Gene Ammons (1925–1974), jazz tenor saxophonist (son of Albert Ammons)
* Lillian Hardin Armstrong (1898–1971), jazz singer/pianist/second wife of Louis Armstrong (Garden of Peace Mausoleum)
* Charles Avery (1892–1974), blues and boogie-woogie pianist
* Big Bill Broonzy (1893–1958), blues musician
* Gwendolyn Brooks (1917–2000), poet, first African American to win a Pulitzer Prize
* James Albert Bray (1870–1944), American bishop, academic administrator and college president
* Bessie Coleman (1892–1926), early African-American aviator
* Johnny Dodds (1892–1940), jazz clarinetist
* Warren "Baby" Dodds (1898–1959), jazz drummer
* Charles "Pat" Dougherty (1879–1939) American baseball pitcher in the pre-Negro leagues
* Andrew Rube Foster (1879–1930), American baseball player, manager, and executive in the Negro leagues. "The father of black baseball."
* William "Bill" Francis (1879–1942) third baseman and manager in the Negro leagues.
* King Daniel Ganaway, photographer (d. 1944)
* Octavius Granady (1872–1928), committeeman in the "Bloody 20th Ward", killed by the mobster Morris Elder.
* Emma Griffin (1877–1918), Vaudeville performer and entrepreneur
* Vivian Harsh (1890–1960), first African American librarian in the Chicago Public Library, created a monumental research collection on black life.
* Al Hibbler (1915–2001), American baritone vocalist.
* Papa Charlie Jackson (1887–1938), American blues singer, songster and banjoist/guitarist
* Tom "College Boy" Johnson (1889–1926) American baseball pitcher in the Negro leagues
* Frank Leland (1869–1914), American baseball player, manager, and executive in the pre-Negro leagues
* Lillian C. Moseley (1905–2007) Bronzeville socialite, worked for notables on both sides of the law: Al Capone, Attorney Roy Washington, The Honorable Harold Washington, first African American Mayor of Chicago and the Honorable Judge Abraham Lincoln Marovitz
* Marian Robinson (1937–2024), Mother of Michelle Obama
* Jimmy Reed (1925–1976), blues musician
* Elder Lucy Smith (1875–1952) first woman to pastor a major Chicago congregation, early radio evangelist.
* Blanche Wilkins Williams (1876–1936), educator of deaf children
* A. Wilberforce Williams (1865–1940), African American physician, teacher and journalist
* Jesse Ernest Wilkins Sr. (1894–1959) Undersecretary of Labor in the Eisenhower administration.
* Ella (Wilson) Wright (1884–1959) schoolteacher and mother of writer Richard Wright 1908–1960.
* At least 14 victims of the Chicago race riot of 1919, including murdered teenager Eugene Williams, whose homicide touched off the riots.