page_title: Lake View Cemetery
section_title: February 1889 proposed rescue plan
hierarchical_section_title: Lake View Cemetery / Financial difficulties / February 1889 proposed rescue plan
caption_attribution_description: English: Photograph of Daniel Parmelee Eells, taken about 1901. Eells was born April 16, 1825, in Westmoreland, New York. His family moved to Amherst, Ohio, when he was 12 years old. Well-educated, he moved to Cleveland in 1844 and started his rise in the banking industry. Becoming wealthy, he became a significant investor in the cement, coke, natural gas, iron, oil, railroad, and steel industries. He died August 14, 1903, and is buried at Lake View Cemetery in Cleveland.
context_page_description: Lake View Cemetery is a privately owned, nonprofit garden cemetery located in the cities of Cleveland, Cleveland Heights, and East Cleveland in the U.S. state of Ohio. Founded in 1869, the cemetery was favored by wealthy families during the Gilded Age, and today the cemetery is known for its numerous lavish funerary monuments and mausoleums. The extensive early monument building at Lake View helped give rise to the Little Italy neighborhood, but over-expansion nearly bankrupted the burial ground in 1888. Financial recovery only began in 1893, and took several years. Lake View grew and modernized significantly from 1896 to 1915 under the leadership of president Henry R. Hatch. The cemetery's cautious management allowed it to avoid retrenchment and financial problems during the Great Depression.
  Two sites within the cemetery are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The first is the James A. Garfield Memorial, erected in 1890 as the tomb of assassinated President James A. Garfield. The second is Wade Memorial Chapel, which began construction in 1898 and was completed in 1901.
context_section_description: The initial plan to save Lake View Cemetery, proposed by association officials, paid bondholders 3 percent of interest due in cash and the remainder in scrip. The cemetery would also create a sinking fund to redeem scrip. To generate revenue, the cost of lots would be halved to just 25 cents ($7 in 2019 dollars) a square foot; the surge in lot-buying, it was believed would raise $2 million ($56.9 million in 2019 dollars). In addition, spending on cemetery improvements would be cut back sharply. The reaction of the bondholders was not reported, but area businesspeople began suggesting that the city of Cleveland purchase the cemetery.
  The plan was amended at the end of April 1889 so that all interest coming due that year was paid in scrip. Interest due after 1889 would be paid 3 percent in cash, 4 percent in scrip. The cemetery agreed to pay 6 percent annual interest on scrip, to devote all income first to maintaining the cemetery and second to paying cash interest, and to create a second sinking fund dedicated to redeeming bonds at maturity. Excess income (after expenditures for maintenance and cash interest) would go toward the sinking funds, redemption of scrip, a fund to pay the next year's cash interest, and to pay other debts. Significant bondholder opposition to the plan began to emerge.
  In June 1889, the Lake View Cemetery Association paid only 3 percent of the 7 percent annual interest due in cash, the remainder in scrip. The cemetery was forced to redeem $11,000 ($300,000 in 2019 dollars) in bonds at par that month alone as payment for lots. The redemption of bonds significantly impacted the cemetery's cash flow, and by the end of 1889 it could not pay any interest in cash. Income was so negatively impacted by the exchange of bonds for lots that cemetery trustees admitted on June 1, 1889, that no cash interest would be paid at the end of the year; all interest would be paid in scrip. The trustees also warned that scrip might not be issued unless bondholders agreed to the cemetery's financial rescue plan. Angry bondholders began to threaten lawsuits to personally hold the trustees responsible for the payment of interest.
  The bonds-for-lots exchange program proved financially disastrous. Lake View sold lots worth $12,000 in September 1889 but received only $1,000 in cash as the remainder was paid in bonds. In the same month, maintenance expenses amounted to $5,000. At the beginning of October 1889, the association stopped accepting the full amount of bonds for the purchase of lots, and said it would accept bonds for only one-third of the lot sale price. The cemetery also agreed to accept scrip for up to a third of a lot's cost as well.
caption: Daniel P. Eells, the cemetery trustee who proposed the November 1889 financial rescue plan
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