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The gravestone is an invaluable source of information, but it is only one of a complex series of mortuary rituals that can reveal much about the culture of the dead. These include rituals of preburial such as wakes and funerals, the participation of funeral homes and churches, and the contributions of burial societies that occasionally helped fund the proceedings. For the past four hundred years, AfricanAmericanfamilieshavesyncretizedbelief systemsthatcombineWestAfrican, Christian, and evolving American traditions. In funerary rituals, these efforts have created new customs that persist alongside practices found throughout America. From Home to Hospital To understand the transition from preemancipation rituals to late nineteenth- and twentieth-century practices, we have to consider broader changes in American attitudes toward death that have impacted African American families. American funerary behavior has been dictated by modern-day sensibilities and expectations, including the participation of funeral homesand other “death care”specialistssuch as morticians. This professionalism of death has distanced most Americans from mortuary obligations such as cleaning the body and preparing it for viewing in a coffin. This physical and emotional distance is further compounded by the increasing numbers of Americans who die in a hospital rather than at home. Today more than 60 percent of Americans die in a hospital bed, surrounded by doctors and nurses.1 The hospital may not allow family members to spend the night in the room. In many cases, the sick pass on with no witnesses. In the nineteenth century, it would have been difficult to die alone. Most Americans died at home unless they succumbed on a battlefield or at sea or suffered a fatal accident at work. When someone fell seriously ill and his or her time was deemed to be near, family, friends, and occasionally a member of the clergy gathered at the bedside.2 For example, in 1846 in Schenectady, New York, a young 5 THE NETWORK OF DEATH Funerals, Churches, and Burial Societies 67 The Network of Death mother died of tuberculosis at home, in bed. Her father wrote that “we kept our solemn vigil around her dying bed all night.”3 In 1790 a Virginia preacher recorded his wife’s last words: when asked “whether she was happy in her soul she replied ‘Yes, O yes!’”4 This tradition dates to the middle ages, when deathbed gatherings were considered an important opportunity to pass wisdom on to surviving generations . Family members would wait and watch, careful to announce the death only after several simple tests were performed, such as checking for breath with a mirror or listening for a heartbeat. There was a common fear that those who were simply unconscious might be mistaken for dead. This led to the development of a variety of safety devices, designed to alert the living in case someone was accidentally buried alive. One such device was an aboveground bell, connected by a wire to the coffin. If the presumed deceased found him- or herself awake in a subterranean coffin, he or she could pull the wire, thereby ringing the bell and alerting passersby to the mistake. The involvement of American families in these death rituals over centuries contrasts starkly with the twentieth-century tendency toward “death avoidance.”5 In southern African American communities, a segregated, parallel industry evolved around the care of the dead. In the decades prior to the formation of black funeral homes (ca. 1880s), black churches and secret organizations were already helping to care for the sick and bury the dead.6 Booker T. Washington bemoaned this focus on dying, complaining, “The trouble with us is that we are always preparing to die.”7 As the popularity of embalming and the professional “death care” industry grew, African American funerals homes were founded, enabling this community to manage their deaths according to more modern sensibilities. Postemancipation African American Funerary Rituals After emancipation, black communities in central Virginia had more choices in memorializing their dead. Late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century African American mortuary rituals took several forms, depending on the class and socioeconomic status of the survivors. The first step was always to wash the body and select the burial clothes. The wealthy might purchase a new set of clothes, while poorer families would have fewer choices. Once the body was washed and dressed, it was laid out, usually in the parlor, for the wake. Like preemancipation rituals, postemancipation African American wakes are often referred to as the “settin’ up.” The wake originated in Europe in the 1400s, when family members watched over the body...

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