Hart Island
— — the quiet island that holds a million of New York's names.
Not only on a wall.
“Hart Island is the city's public burial ground. A little over a mile long, it sits in Long Island Sound off City Island, reached by a short ferry from the Bronx. More than a million New Yorkers are buried here, in trenches marked by white wooden stakes and concrete monuments. For most of its history the island was run by the Department of Correction and largely closed to the public. In 2021 the city moved it under the Parks Department, and visiting families now have regular access. Gulls work the shoreline. The grass is kept short. — from the studio
Hart Island, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
Hart Island is a roughly 131-acre island in Long Island Sound, part of the borough of the Bronx in New York City. It lies just east of City Island, separated by a narrow channel. The City of New York acquired the island in 1868 and the first burial took place in 1869. Since then more than a million people have been buried here, making Hart Island the largest publicly funded cemetery in the United States. Civil War prisoners, yellow-fever and influenza victims, and unclaimed residents from across the five boroughs lie in mass trenches marked by simple wooden stakes.
The island carries an industrial-era stillness. Empty buildings from earlier institutional uses, a tuberculosis hospital, a reformatory, a Cold War Nike missile site, stand in various states of weathering along the spine of the island. Burials are conducted in trenches that hold roughly 150 adults each, with infant trenches separate. From 2020 the trench count rose sharply as COVID-19 burials moved here. Gulls and cormorants work the shoreline year round, and a small monument near the southern end, raised in 1948, reads simply Cross of Calvary 1941.
Access changed in July 2021 when jurisdiction transferred from the Department of Correction to the Department of Parks and Recreation. The Hart Island Project and NYC Parks now run scheduled gravesite visits and limited general visits, reached by a short ferry from the Fordham Street dock on City Island. Visitors must book in advance through the Parks Department. The dock is on the western shore of City Island, accessible by the Bx29 bus from Pelham Bay Park subway station on the IRT Pelham Line.