Evans City Cemetery - Evans City, Pennsylvania

I made it back to Highbury HQ just in time to roll out a very special Cemetery Sundays edition. Usually, Cemetery Sundays is reserved for the month of October, when I roam the grounds of a local cemetery, documenting and sharing photographs of the old and beautiful tombstones. But I found myself near Pittsburgh and had some extra time, so I decided to check out one of the cemeteries that had been on the top of my list: Evans City Cemetery.

What is so special about this cemetery and what was it that put it at the top of my list? Ask any fellow horror geek and they'll tell you! It isn't often that you can visit a place that is part of horror film history. A place that started a revolution!

See, Evans City Cemetery was one of the locations for the filming of George Romero's zombie-genre defining classic from 1968, Night of the Living Dead!

If you'd like some music to go along with this post, I still have the film's soundtrack, ripped directly from the original vinyl (complete with "vintage" pops and cracks!) available for free here.

Many of the tombstones and other features that were used in the opening scenes of the film are still standing some 46 years later...



Upon entering the grounds, you'll find the original chapel (which is currently being renovated after falling into disrepair) where Johnny and Barbara parked to visit their father's grave.

 (Strange that George Romero isn't credited on the plaque as one of the directors!)

On the side of the building was an entryway, although I was not feeling adventurous on this day.

I also found the tombstones where Johnny and Barbara paid their respects, shortly before things take a turn for the worse...

"They're coming to get you, Barbara."

And I'm happy to see that after many people have visited and photographed this particular tombstone, it is still clean and vandalism-free.

And finally, when poor Johnny meets his end at the hands of the cemetery ghoul, his head is smashed against the Father Clyde Lewis Myers tombstone.

And while it is really, really cool to see the horror nostalgia of the grounds, it would be a mistake to not go and see some of the interesting and wonderfully weathered old stones throughout the rest of the cemetery...