Mike Chowla

Glenwood Cemetery

Cemeteries provide a unique window into the past of a city. In nearly every city, there's usually one where most of the prominent people from that city's history are buried. In Houston, that cemetery is Glennwood Cemetery. The cemetery is surprisingly close to downtown and parts of it even have a good view of sky-scrapers downtown.

My favorite statuary in Glenwood is at the graves of Walter Benona Sharp (December 12, 1870 – November 28, 1912) and Estelle Boughton Sharp (June 19, 1873 – August 30, 1965) and is titled Roses of Yesterday. In this image gallery, it's the last 3 images. The sculpture was created by Harriet Whitney Frishmuth. Walter Sharp was the business partner of Howard Hughes Sr. whose son is the famous and eccentric Howard R. Hughes Jr. Sharp and Hughes Sr. created a drill bit for drilling oil wells in hard rock. Sharp died too soon to see the financial success of the drill bit and Hughes Sr. bought out his interest in the company after he died. It was that drilling tool company that made Howard Hughes Jr. a millionaire at age 18 when his parents died. Both Hughes Sr. and Hughes Jr. are buried in Glenwood but I wasn't able to locate their family tomb.

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