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Archiver > QUAKER-ROOTS > 1998-03 > 0888955569


From: DBaker3381 <>
Subject: Re: Photographs of the Dead
Date: Tue, 3 Mar 1998 15:06:09 EST


In a message dated 98-03-03 14:06:16 EST, writes:

<<
My great aunt(by marriage) kept a framed photograph of her father in his
coffin in the dining room. It hung opposite the dining room table - very off
putting for a small child. My aunts tell me that the customs of
photographing the dead is more of a European custom. My father's family is
German and Czech and photagraphs of the deceased family members are very
common after about 1880.
>>
In my family in South Georgia (Wiregrass Georgia), it is still a common
practice for photographs to be taken of the deceased in the coffin. Pictures
exist of my father and grandparents in the coffin. They are too unsettling
for me to look at, but there are family members who have attended all the
funerals of the family and gone about their merry way snapping photos. Then
they keep an album of their collection of photos of all the deceased in their
coffins and their graves. I have not seen this practice in any other area.
Have any others encountered this morbid custom anywhere?

Dot Baker

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