Mount Ararat Cemetery

Nashville, Davidson, Tennessee, United States

Change Your Language

close

You can change the language of the BillionGraves website by changing the default language of your browser.

Learn More
English
Register
Total Records
286
Total Images
257

My Photo Requests

Not finding what you are looking for?

Make a photo request to let nearby users know who you are looking for. Make a Photo Request

Add Records to Mount Ararat Cemetery

Do you have records from Mount Ararat Cemetery?

Add your records to BillionGraves and make them last forever. Add headstone images Add Other Records

Get Started

Get started contributing to Mount Ararat Cemetery. Use the button below to begin a simple step by step process to get started contributing to Mount Ararat Cemetery.
Get Started
Transcribed Records
Untranscribed Images
Flagged Images

Add Records to Mount Ararat Cemetery

Do you have records from Mount Ararat Cemetery?

Add your records to BillionGraves and make them last forever. Add headstone images Add Other Records

Events at Mount Ararat Cemetery

There are no upcoming events scheduled at Mount Ararat Cemetery. Use the button below to schedule one.
Schedule Event
Schedule Event
close
Step 1: Name your event
Step 2: Pick a date
Step 3: Pick a time

Contributors

More

Images

    BG App Images    Supporting Record Images
1 - 60 navigate_before navigate_next

Cemetery Information

edit

Number of Images

257

Number of Headstone Records

286

Description

One of the most moving historic sites in Nashville is Mount Ararat Cemetery (Orr Avenue off Elm Hill Pike), the first African-American cemetery in Middle Tennessee. Now badly neglected, this cornerstone of the city's African-American social history is hemmed in on all sides by heavy trucking development, I-40 and Purity Dairy. In April 1869, Mount Ararat was founded by local black leaders, who purchased property just north of Murfreesboro Pike at the junction of Elm Hill Pike for the cemetery. After 1910, the cemetery deteriorated until it was revived in the 1920s. By the 1970s, however, much of Mount Ararat again was overgrown with trees and brush. In 1982, the board of directors of nearby Greenwood Cemetery—founded in 1886 by the late Preston Taylor, then a prominent pastor and the city's pre-eminent African American undertaker—took Mount Ararat under management. They cleared brush and trees and restored some neglected sections. Lost over the years, though, was perhaps the cemetery's most invaluable feature—its interment records and the histories of its eternal residents.
BillionGraves.com
Mount Ararat Cemetery, Created by BillionGraves, Nashville, Davidson, Tennessee, United States