Green-Wood Cemetery

Brooklyn

Arguably one of New York City's most famous grave sites, Green-Wood Cemetery was founded in 1838 in an area just southwest of the Brooklyn's Prospect Park. Among those interred at Green-Wood include 1980's downtown auteur Jean-Michel Basquiat, infamous 1800's gang leader William "Bill the Butcher" Poole (portrayed by Daniel Day Lewis in Gangs of New York), as well as hundreds of early pioneers of a new 1800's sport called baseball.

Visitors to Green-Wood will most certainly want to check out the Gothic Revival entrance gate at the cemetery's entrance on 5th Avenue and 25th Street. In addition to the beautiful design, it's also the nesting grounds for a flock of monk parakeets from South America that now call the cemetery home. The birds escaped from a container at JFK Airport in the 1960's and have populated the area ever since.