Friends of Greenlawn Cemetery Foundation

03/30/2026

Thank you WNXT!

Thankful for these women! Linda Tieman and Melissa Appleton came in today to talk this coming Sunday morning’s annual Easter Sunrise Service at Greenlawn Cemetery. They will gather in front of the historic Greenlawn Cemetery Chapel beginning at 7am. Bring a friend and make it an Easter morning tradition. We would love to see you there! ⛪🌸🎶

03/30/2026

Monument Monday 🪦

Colonel Troilus Jura Graham
January 22, 1810
January 30, 1898

Troilus Jura Graham, known as T.J., was born near Snickers Gap, Virginia, on January 22, 1810. He attended Bloomfield Academy and Rockbridge College.

He moved, along with his father, to Muskingum County, Ohio, when he was seventeen years old. T.J. worked on the family farm until he was nineteen years old. He taught school for a short time before moving to Zanesville, Ohio. He remained there two years working in the dry goods store of Robert and James Golden.

He moved to Chillicothe, Ohio, in 1831, to teach at a “select” school of around one hundred students and then went to work in a clothing store known as “White and Douglas”, eventually becoming a partner in the business.

While in Chillicothe he married Miss Harriet Scott (1836), daughter of Judge Thomas Scott.

T.J. was quite a society young man in Chillicothe and occupied a prominent position. He commanded a fancy military company in the city, and was made Colonel of the County Militia in Ross County. In 1837 and 1838, he attended the legislature as a lobbyist and secured the passage of a new militia law of which he was the author.

He came to Portsmouth as Colonel Graham and remained so his entire life.

While visiting in Columbus he became acquainted with Dr. John Glover. Dr. Glover convinced him to come to Portsmouth and become the hotel keeper of the Watson House in Portsmouth. He landed in Portsmouth in 1839, and lived there for the remainder of his life. The steamboats, the canal, and the stage line were all doing a big business as Portsmouth had become a boom town.

The Watson was known as the best hotel in Portsmouth. Some of his distinguished guests included Henry Clay, Allen Thurman, John Crittenden, William Allen and John Quincy Adams. He was known as an excellent landlord charging two dollars a week for meals and board. The Colonel remained in charge of the hotel for eighteen years when he sold it to John Row & Son.

Colonel Graham married Miss Eliza Tobin in 1855, after the death of his first wife, Harriet. Soon after Governor Salmon P. Chase appointed him canal collector and inspector.

During the war, he was made a treasury agent in the south.

On a return trip from Vicksburg, his boat, the ill-fated steamboat the “Missouri”, exploded during the night of January 30, 1866, near Smithfield, Kentucky. Over one hundred people were killed with many of them being from Portsmouth. Fortunately, the Colonel was in his stateroom, but he was still seriously injured and permanently disabled and never fully recovered from his injuries.

Although he suffered life changing injuries he was able to work again starting with the National Express Company in Portsmouth.

In 1869, he was elected a Justice of the Peace in Portsmouth. In 1874, he took charge of the of the St. James Hotel in Cincinnati but returned to Portsmouth for good in 1876. He was appointed City Infirmary Director by City Council upon his return and served in that position until his death in 1898. He was a member of All Saints Church.

Colonel Troilus Jura Graham died on January 20, 1898.
Eliza Tobin Graham died in 1914.
They are buried right inside the Grant Street gate in the Robinson section.

03/30/2026

Join us this coming Sunday morning for our annual Easter Sunrise Service. We will gather in front of the historic Greenlawn Cemetery Chapel beginning at 7am. Bring a friend and make it an Easter morning tradition. We would love to see you there! ⛪🌸🎶

03/26/2026

Join us bright and early Easter Sunday, April 5th, at 7 am for our Annual Easter Sunrise Service at Greenlawn Cemetery.

03/25/2026

Join us on Easter Sunday, April 5th at 7AM at the historic Chapel in Greenlawn Cemetery in Portsmouth for our annual Sunrise Service ✝️ Invite your friends and family and we’ll see you there ☀️

03/23/2026

Monument Monday 🪦

John Pease Terry
February 16, 1807
May 18, 1886

John Pease Terry was born in Coldbrook, New Hampshire, on February 16, 1807. His parents, Charles and Huldah (Pease) Terry, moved to Sodus Point, New York, when John was three years old.

His father, Charles, was a minuteman and was killed at the Burning of the Point by the British in 1814. This was when the British forces burned Washington, D.C., destroying the White House, the U.S. Capital, and other government buildings.

Shortly after his fathers death, he moved to Ontario County, New York, to live with Wells Whitman until he turned eighteen years old. He learned farming from his time there. Although he did not have any formal education, through private study and perseverance he acquired a fair education.

In 1825, he borrowed one dollar from his mother and headed west staying in Buffalo, Cleveland, Akron, and Newbury.

In 1828, he was hired by Francis Cleveland in the engineer corp of the Ohio and Erie Canal. Due to his diligent study, he was promoted several times until he eventually became assistant engineer serving under Mr. Cleveland until 1832.

In 1832, he became a contractor on the Cincinnati & Harrison Turnpike. He became a stockholder and manager of the Clinton Furnace Company until 1834. At this time he was financially ruined by the failure of Jacob Clingman as he had endorsed notes.

He started over in Indiana working as an engineer on the Wabash and Erie Canal taking on large contracts and finishing them in 1837. Having again acquired considerable capital he moved to Portsmouth.

He joined Richard Lloyd establishing a wholesale boot and shoe business remaining together until 1840. He purchased a farm in Washington Township. He, along with William Waller, W. Davis, and Samuel Cole shipped produce to New Orleans from 1843-1845. With Mr. Waller and Mr. Cole he bought the Quarry Flouring Mills and Tannery. In 1853, he retired from there and built the Madison Furnace in Jackson County. He sold it and bought the Buckeye Furnace.

He retired (again) from Buckeye Furnace in 1870. In 1873, he went to Missouri to build the Hamilton Furnace but it was not profitable so he returned to Portsmouth.

Mr. Terry became Superintendent and President of the Portsmouth Iron and Steel Company.

He was the director, stockholder and eventually President of the First National Bank of Portsmouth. He served several terms on City Council and the Portsmouth School Board.

Mr. Terry married Susan Waller, daughter of Dr. Thomas Waller, in 1832 and they had several children. Their son, Thomas, was a Cadet at West Point dying in 1864 during a battle in the Civil War. Their sons, Louis and George, were in Company A, Thirty-third Ohio Infantry in what was known as President Lincoln’s Guards stationed in Washington, D.C.

John and Susan Waller Terry are buried in the Evergreen 3 section near the Grant Street fence.

03/22/2026

Heartbreaking.

03/20/2026

Honey bees and flowers, please. Happy first day of SPRING!🌞🌷🐝

03/17/2026

"If you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain."~Dolly Parton 🌈

03/16/2026

Monument Monday 🪦

🍀We survive. We're Irish. We have the souls of poets. We love our misery, we delight in the beauty of strange places and dark places in our hearts.~Ellis Flynn

Philip H. Kelley
April 9, 1823
June 15, 1900

Philip Kelly was born in Tipperary, Ireland, on April 9, 1823. He was born to Timothy and Bridget Maher Kelley and had one sister. His father died when he was eighteen. In 1848, he brought his mother to America landing in Auburn, New York.

He moved to Cleveland, Ohio, in 1849, and worked as a stone cutter, the trade he learned in Ireland. He worked on the railroad for two years beginning in 1851. In 1853, he became a contractor for railroad work and other structures usually in bridge construction.

He married Miss Ann Hayes of Delaware, Ohio, in 1855, and they had eight children.

They came to Portsmouth in 1857. He came to the river city to build the piers for the suspension bridge at the mouth of the Scioto River and decided to remain.

He purchased the Massie Block and owned it for many years. In 1863, he purchased a house on Jackson Street.

In 1871, he built the Portsmouth Water Works, and was one of its first board members.

The Massie Block was tragically destroyed by a fire, which started in the Biggs House, in 1871. Mr. Kelley immediately rebuilt the entire block.

In 1881, he built the abutments of the great railroad bridge over the Ohio River at Point Pleasant. In 1883, he built the piers of the of the Cincinnati & Eastern railroad bridge across the Scioto River, two miles north of Portsmouth, for $26,000. He lost every dollar on this project. He suffered many great losses in the failure of the Citizens Savings Bank as well as the Farmers National Bank of Portsmouth.

Mr. Kelley was a very honest man and believed everyone else was too. His unlimited faith in his fellow men caused him many financial losses. He never complained or lost his faith in humanity. He was incapable of hating anyone and simply pitied those who robbed him.

His losses by fire and failures, were accepted with the utmost composure. He always met disaster with honor.

“He was one of the purest, most simple-minded men who ever lived in Portsmouth. If he had any enemies, he never deserved them. He always did the best he could under any circumstance and never worried the results. No more truthful, sincere, honest, or upright man and citizen ever dwelt in Portsmouth.”

Mr. Philip H. Kelley died June 15, 1900, at 77 years old. His wife, Ann, died in 1887, at the age of 54. They are buried in a family plot in the Holy Redeemer circle.

03/15/2026

Finding something interesting here every single day. Do you get it?😂

03/09/2026

Monument Monday

Dr. Andrew Barry Jones
April 20, 1829
October 15, 1876

Andrew Barry Jones was born in Hillsboro, Ohio, on April 20, 1829. His parents, Robert and Ruth Jones, came to Ohio, from Virginia, in 1828.

His early education was obtained in the local schools. He chose medicine for a profession and graduated from the Cleveland Medical College with the highest honors of his class in 1850. He immediately began practicing medicine in Adams County during a raging Cholera outbreak.

He married Maria J. Dunbar from Adams County in 1851.

In 1852, the couple moved to Portsmouth, Ohio, with Dr. Jones starting a very successful medical practice.

His love of anatomy along with his proficiency led him to excel as a surgeon. He was in demand far away from his Portsmouth home and was frequently consulted by surgeons from other states.

He was one of the founders of the Scioto County Medical Society, and for many years he served as its President. He was also a prominent member of the Ohio Valley Medical Society and was President of the Ohio State Medical Association for one year. He was an honorary member of the California State Medical Society and a member of the National Medical Society. He was appointed by Governor William Allen to the Board of Trustees of the Southeastern Ohio Insane Asylum in Athens.

No member of his profession was known to be more loyal to the code of ethics than he was. His attention and care of the poor and those unable to pay was always the same as his paying patients and there was never a charge to the needy. His charity and kindness did not end with his many voluntary professional calls as he always made sure the destitute were provided with food and assistance. “He took with him to the bedside of the of the afflicted not only the scientific knowledge of his profession, but a heart full of Christian sympathy, a soothing voice, hope-breathing sentiments, and the sunlight of an encouraging cheerfulness.”

He was known to be a kind friend, refined, and a good citizen. He was devoted to the care of his parents until their death.

He was known to be an exceptional writer but his career demands prevented him from doing so. He was a member of All Saints Episcopal Church and a devoted student of the Bible.

Dr. Jones and his wife, Maria, are buried in the Evergreen Section-Div 4.

Maria's epitaph reads:

Here Dissolves The House That Sheltered The Altruistic Spirit Of The Beloved Embodiment Of Benevolent Righteousness.

Maria J. Dunbar Jones
Wife of J. B. Carter
Liberated
Nov. 1st, 1896
Aged 62 Years, 6 Mts.
And 1 Day.

Rest, My Love, Until The Dawning Of The Morning When The Shadows Dark Shall Flee Away.