Attend a FREE concert of Christmas music followed by a reading of the classic poem ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas” by Clement Clarke Moore.
After the family-friendly concert and reading, everybody follows folk dressed in Victorian costume for a lantern procession two blocks to Moore’s grave for a wreath-laying ceremony, and then back to the Church of the Intercession, 155th St. and Broadway, for cookies and donuts, hot chocolate for the kids and wine for the grown-ups.
‘Twas the Night Before Christmas Reading is a lovely event, with choral performances by local school children and professional opera singers, and the reading is by NYC celebrities.
Moore’s tomb is at Trinity Church Cemetery & Mausoleum, 155th St. and Riverside Drive. It’s the “uptown” branch of the better-known Trinity Church and cemetery in the financial district, blocks from the 9/11 Memorial, where Alexander Hamilton and his family are buried, along with other famous Revolutionary Era patriots.
The concert begins at 3pm, Sunday, December 16th, and the visit to the gravesite follows at around 4:30pm. Take the kids, and your imagination.
The #1 train stops practically at the front door of the church.
SEE ALSO
The story behind the Christmas carol Silent Night, Holy Night,
which is 200 years old in 2018
Clement Clarke Moore is just one of the famous folk buried here.
Famous people buried in Trinity Church Cemetery & Mausoleum
There’s another Christmas story here.
John Jacob Astor and John Jacob Astor III are buried here, the ancestors of John Jacob Astor IV, the real estate tycoon and wealthiest man in America at the time, one of 1,514 souls who perished aboard the Titanic in 1914.
There is a memorial to Astor IV, who built the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, named after the family’s hometown, Waldorf, Germany.
Also buried here is John James Audubon, world-famous painter of bird species. The Audubon Society is named for him.
New York City is part of the Atlantic Flyover, and hundreds of bird species fly through NYC north or south on their annual seasonal migrations. Among many other conservation efforts, Audubon New York does an annual bird count each season in Central Park.
Award-winning actor Jerry Orbach also is buried here. He was in the original cast of the Broadway play The Fantastiks, and introduced us all to the song Try to Remember.
But Orbach is more famous for his roles as the father in the iconic film Dirty Dancing, and as Detective Lennie Briscoe in the long-running TV show Law and Order.
The folk in Victorian costumes, with lanterns, will help you find their gravesites. So this is a history lesson as well as a holiday event.
Find out more details about this historic cemetery on the Audubon Park Historic District website.
More about ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas
In case you have forgotten all the words, here they are, courtesy of Poets.org.
What do you think about this? We welcome your comments.