Forest Home Cemetery & Arboretum

Wonderful organization celebrating 175 years in Milwaukee! They always have great free events to the community. I appreciate visiting my mom’s grave with these events, because it continuously celebrates life after death. Pictures also of the reinactors from this past Memorial Day celebration!

The cemetery opens at 8am till approximately 7pm. It's a beautiful cemetery park with lots of trees and you can either walk around or even drive through the whole cemetery. Please respect that it's a cemetery

The office and maintenance staff here are amazing! My car broke down in the cemetery. Everyone was extremely helpful and went above and beyond trying to get us back on the road. Ultimately we had to get a tow truck which they helped us out with that too, thanks for the recommendation Jonathan! They even gave us water and checked in us while we waited. Thank you so much to the office and maintenance staff, your efforts are greatly appreciated.

We took a walking tour called "Deadbeats - Milwaukee's musicians". As someone who loves history and music, this tour was right up my alley. Their tour season is just kicking off so I added their upcoming schedule as there's something for everyone. Forest Home is huge, so we did a fair amount of walking. The tour had a lot of info about the beginning of the music scene in Milwaukee. Cool tour. We'll be taking a few more of these now that we did this one

Famous 19th Century cemetery serving as the final resting place for more than 1,000 civil war veterans and prominent people from Milwaukee's history. Beautiful grounds designed by a famous Wisconsin naturalist. Ideal for self-guided tours, birdwatching, and exploration! The site is full of amazing monuments. Be sure to stop by the office for a visitor's guide. Public tours and events available year round.

Beautiful historical cemetery. Lots of history here and famous people have been buried here. It's so quiet and peaceful. They have a little museum in the building. It's a great place to take a walk, drive around or just to visit a loved one whom has passed. You can sometimes see deer around.

Gorgeous place to walk in the Fall. The trees are so beautiful! So much Milwaukee history here. I stopped in the office to pick up a map & pamphlet with info about the different graves & mausoleums & the woman working the office was so friendly & helpful.

I attended the Funerary Art & Symbolism tour at Forest Home Cemetery and would absolutely recommend it to others. Equal parts educational and entertaining, our tour guide was knowledgeable and well-spoken. There’s so much fascinating information to cover and the grounds are massive (not to mention beautiful). I imagine these tours could be two to three times as long and still not come remotely close to covering everything! There’s an abundance of history here. Bring a water bottle and pack a snack, because you could spend hours exploring the cemetery after the tour.

"Spirits of the Silent City" tour during the Halloween season is great. The cemetery is a beautiful place that becomes the perfect setting for a guided tour of its "residents" themselves. The actors are very professional and do an excellent job. Parking was challenging as the info was confusing; make sure you know well in advance if you have to park on the street. My husband and I had a lot of fun in this tour. Tip: Bundle up and wear your waterproof shoes.

This is a BEAUTIFUL and historic cemetery. I took a tour of famous Milwaukee "residents" and was amazed. It is also an arboretum so I'd highly recommend a visit when the leaves change. Recommended for locals and tourists alike.

One of the best historical cemeteries in the country. If you visit Milwaukee, you truly should visit this graveyard. I know, it sounds strange to say, come to Milwaukee see the sites, come visit some graves. But the people in these graves truly built Milwaukee. You got Schlitz, Blatz, Pabst, Davidson (w/out Harley), General, Billy Mitchell, the Werwath Family (founders of MSOE), Usinger,, famous actors, countless politicians, and many people who have streets named after them. Plus the place just looks really cool.

All is want to to have tge cemetery buy back my brother's crib. He passed away in Co and we had him cremated and spread his ashes in the mountains. Can this please be arranged?

Our family owns 10 plots there and they say they aren't worth much. Because it has been used for charities we can't get much information. If anybody knows what is going on there please inform me of what is fact and what isn't. Our plots are in the most exclusive site. Benje Much appreciated.

We visited the cemetery this morning and it's pretty & large. Some of the trees already had lovely colors (early fall) and there are some nice monuments. The reason why I'm not giving five stars is because I've visited many gorgeous cemeteries and therefore I'm comparing Forest Home to those.

Forest Home Cemetery is one of the most beautiful, peaceful spots in the city for sure. My husband is a wee bit obsessed with local history so we've done a Historic Milwaukee tour here, visited for Doors Open and driven through many times looking for some local notable or other. If you don't care about history, Forest Home is still an amazing visit. The paths are great for walking or jogging (no dogs allowed) and the landscaping is absolutely beautiful. The cemetery is home to the largest collection of "old" trees in the city and many are labeled as to type and age. That also means it's a great place for birdwatchers. If you do care about history, this place is something else! It's a prime example of Victorian landscape design - there's a pond, a grotto and a small river. Admire the imposing monuments and wonder who the heck these people were in life and what that giant mausoleum cost. There's lots of familiar names, especially in "Brewers Row" - you literally cannot miss the Pabst monument, it's the largest in the cemetery. In the visitor center the "Halls of History" is a museum detailing all of the famous folks interred here, it's really interesting. If you happen to visit during Doors Open (highly recommend) you'll get to tour the beautiful church and even see the old crematory. Creepy AND educational! Obligatory dad joke - "Forest Hill is a great place, people are dying to get in".

This place is way cool. There is some really great Milwaukee history here and they have brochures that show you how to do guided self-tours. There is almost too much to see in one trip which makes this place great to come back to for multiple visits. We brought our toddler and he loved walking around (there were lots of cool sticks for him to collect). It was a nice change from the typical playgrounds we usually spend our time at. My husband and I loved that there was plenty to keep us entertained (feels strange saying that about a cemetery visit) while our little one played. We especially loved getting some great ideas for vintage throw-back names. Did you know that Hedwig was an actual name before it was ever Harry Potter's owl?!? (See if you can find that one!) I definitely recommend checking out the Blatz mausoleum. Very cool. They are open every day from sunup to sundown.

My husband and I went on a history tour here for Doors Open, after brunch at Story Hill BKC, because hipsters. We were super shocked that there was still a tons of options to be buried here, seeing as how it's WICKED OLD. And incredibly beautiful. That was last week, and this morning we went back and asked about their Green Burial part of the cemetery. Since my husband has always been pretty clear that he "just wants to be thrown in a burlap sack and kicked into the hole," this is as close as it gets. I drive a Prius and recycle, and have serious misgivings about cremation, since I think burning trash is terrible, and definitely don't want people/plants/animals breathing whatever chemo-crap I'll be made of once I'm out for the count. We worked with Garen who was super friendly and easy to talk to, and did not seem all "sales-y". Like, just a normal person, which I appreciated. An hour later, we were the proud owners of two spaces in the the Prairie Rest field. Did I mention that it is also incredibly beautiful? It's like that Mumford and Sons "Hopeless Wanderer" video, but without hot comedians... For now.

Someone's a secret goth. Someone has two thumbs and is a secret goth. This guy has two thumbs, and is said secret goth. Not so secret anymore, is it? Whatever, I'm comfortable with it. Don't you for a second think that I don't hang with some Joy Division, Souxsie, and Robert Smith from time to time. I make "black like my coffee black like my soul" jokes and I'm 28 for chrissakes. C'mon now... do you really take it all that seriously? I feel for you if you do, my friends. Enter the concept of: spending time in a cemetery for enjoyment. It's not as morbid as you may think. In fact, I find cemeteries to be quite peaceful places that cause pause and quiet moments that serve to foster (real) time and allow me to devote thought space to existential queries and deep thoughts about personhood and mortality. Not Jack Handy deep thoughts, y'all... real ones. The ones that hit home. The ones that (generally speaking) folks don't want to talk about, ever. Enter Forest Home Cemetery, my favorite cemetery in MKE. Not just because it's vast, expansive, and absolutely gorgeous, but also for the history and the urban reprieve. (Why yes, I am aware that Milwaukee's park system has been nationally recognized for being superstellar intergalactic awesome, thankyouverymuch. But remember that whole secret goth thing? THAT.) There's something really fantastic about reflecting upon your own mortality and remembering that you are a tiny speck of reconstructed star stuff given just a fleeting, momentary blip on the universe's radar, and it's easier to do that when you're imagining lives gone by and spending time with those no longer living. I like to make up stories for folks that once were by considering their names, their birth dates, their grave sites, and imagining what they might have been or might have wanted to be. Rachel = serious weird-ohhhhh? If you guys don't want to hang out with me now I understand, I guess. Your loss. Being a secret goth is a good thing.

Okay I'm branching out slightly from my typical review genre of restaurants because I'd like more people to know about this place. You may think me a bit morbid, but Forrest Home Cemetery is one of my favorite haunts. It's rolling hills and valleys are breathtakingly beautiful. Filled with trees, a gorgeous pond, and a relief bridge. The roadways are paved making this a perfect place to walk, jog, rollerblade or ride your bike or even picnic. It is also one of the best places to see examples of all lines of architecture. Many of the mausoleums and tombstones are veritable works of art, stunning in their beauty and craft. You will see the final resting places of the makers of Milwaukee. The Blatz Mausoleum, dear god, I want to live in it. I realize how that sounds, but it is towering in it's artistry. The peace and tranquility that envelope you here is astonishing. I often come here to walk, clear my mind, and get inspired by the beauty that lies within it's wrought iron gates. I am currently working on taking pictures of all the incredible grave markers and posting them online for people to see. If you have never been here and looked around, I cannot urge you enough to do so. I promise you will not be disappointed.

Dying used to be fashionable. OK Milwaukee, wanna know why we're here? Then I suggest that you learn who built this town. Where else can you spend time with so many amazing Milwaukeean? (besides a Yelp elite event, of course) The names on the headstones read like the map of Milwaukee: Mitchell, Kilbourn, Walker, Cramer, Marshall, Stowell, Wells, and Downer. I could go on. There are enough brewers and beer barons buried here to fill a liquor store: Pabst, Schlitz, Blatz, and the Uihlein family being the better known names. Don't forget the earlier brewers though: Jung, Best, and Krug. What good would all of that beer heritage be without some brats to wash down? Fred Usinger is a perminant resident. I could go on forever with the list of names, but I suggest you come out and look for yourself. The cemetery was started in 1850 as a retreat for both the living and the dead; I wasn't joking when I said it used to be fashionable. Back in the days of the 6 day, 60hr work week, many families chose to have their Sunday picnics here. Although the plantings and funerary decorations have been scaled back over the past 100 years, it is not difficult here to picture yourself back in Victorian-era Milwaukee. The rolling hills, the meandering roads, the serene ponds and picturesque bridges complete the park-like setting. Everyone comes here for the monuments and mausoleums, and rightly so. I get chills driving through here and reading the names. These people were all "somebodies" in life, and damned if they weren't going to be someone in death as well. Be sure to catch the Milwaukee Historical Society's guided tour every summer. They really help to put faces and stories to the names written in marble. Maybe one day mine will be one of them.