The Friends of Mount Auburn Cemetery is delighted to have received a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) Museums for America Program (MA-31-16-0028-16) for a year-long project which will use new technologies and field data collection methods to design a process for inventorying, documenting, and mapping our plant collections.

The IMLS Museums for America Collections Stewardship grant will support consultant Brian Morgan, of the Alliance for Public Gardens GIS, and an intern who, under the supervision of Mount Auburn staff, will conduct a comprehensive cataloguing and mapping of 100% of the horticultural collections in a five-acre area surrounding Washington Tower.

Mapping this one small parcel of land, with its distinct “landscape character zones,” wildlife habitat, and active planting area, makes the section a perfect area to test new inventory and mapping techniques and technologies across diverse landscape conditions. Processes developed and lessons learned from this area will then be used to develop field-check, inventory, and design protocols to map the remaining 170 acres of the Cemetery’s grounds.