Hartsdale Pet Cemetery Named as One of Top 10 Cemeteries in the World

HARTSDALE, NY November 13, 2008 – The Hartsdale Pet Cemetery is in good company along with the Taj Mahal in India and Egypt's Pyramids of Giza when it comes to listing the world's top 10 cemeteries.

Above ground, or six feet under, "Lonely Planet's Best in Travel 2009" guide lists the 10 best places to die for.

In 1896, Dr. Samuel Johnson, a veterinarian, offered his apple orchard in Westchester County New York to a bereaved friend as the burial place for his dog. Today, Hartsdale Pet Cemetery, known worldwide as The Peaceable Kingdom in Hartsdale, has long been a place where the bonds of unconditional love between humans and animals are honored and remembered. Nearly 70,000 animals over the last 112 years are interred at the Hartsdale Peter Cemetery in Westchester, the oldest pet burial ground in the country. Last year 700 animals were buried and 31,000 animals were cremated there.

The top 10 final places of rest also include the Dogon Tombs in Mali in West Africa where tiny buildings are set into cliffs, often halfway up, with no discernible method of approach; The Non-Catholic Cemetery in Italy, an overgrown garden in Rome where poets Keats and Shelley are buried; Hollywood Forever Cemetery in the United States, whose stately memorials are the final picture for much of Hollywood royalty including Rudolph Valentino, Douglas Fairbanks and Mel Blancs, the voice of Bugs Bunny whose tombstone reads: "That's all folks".

Other cemeteries in the list are The Catacombs of Rome, Italy where early Christians were buried in a series of endless, echoing underground tunnels, out near the old Roman road, the Via Appia; Pere Lachaise Cemetery in France, the world's most visited cemetery, with residents as diverse as Edith Piaf, Marcel Proust, Oscar Wilde, Honore de Blazac and Isadora Duncan; Tomb of Pacal in Mexico, a place of cinematic splendour, complete with rolling mist and thick undergrowth; and The City of the Dead in Egypt, which is the most curious cemetery in the world, where chronic housing shortages in Cairo have driven families to live in tombs in the large cemeteries on the city's outskirts.

For additional information about Hartsdale Pet Cemetery & Crematory, call 914-949-2583, toll-free 800-375-5234. Visit the website at www.petcem.com.