Renowned Be Thy Grave

Author/blogger J.W. Ocker wrote The New England Grimpendium (2010) and The New York Grimpendium (2012), each a travelogue of his experiences exploring macabre sites, attractions, and artifacts in those regions. His blog features odd things he's seen and this week he showcased something he found in Haverhill:

I was perusing the excellent Horror Guide to Massachusetts, a newly released guidebook by the brothers Scott and David Goudsward. The book covers a wide variety of Massachusetts allusions and inspirations from all horror genre media, including both fictional and real-life sites. In that latter category, the brothers pulled some great places out that I’d never come across before...like the fact that Bellairs’s grave was a mere 45 minutes from my house.

Along with some kind words about The House with a Clock in its Walls, Ocker reflects on the cemetery where John, and son, Frank, are buried.

He died in 1991 at age 53 of cardiovascular disease and was buried in Greenwood Cemetery on E. Broadway in Haverhill. The cemetery is a small one, and the grave is easy to find, on the front edge facing E. Broadway. One of the chain-link fence gates opens right on it. The grave is wing-shaped and adjacent to it is a matching wing marking the grave of his son Frank, who died in 1999 at age 29. I’ve never seen a more author tombstone than John Bellairs’s. Beneath his name is the phrase, “Famous Author,” and in the corner is the image of a shelf of books. His epitaph is, “He loved to write stories that children love to read.”

On the back is something that should be on every author’s grave—a selected bibliography.

And I can now cross of The House With a Clock in Its Walls off that stony list.

[Image: Odd Things I've Seen]