MAPACA

Mid-Atlantic Popular &
American Culture Association

For many years, women were known by their husband’s names. Even though Emily Nelson Ritchie was the President General of the Daughters of the American Revolution, credited for completing the construction of Constitution Hall, while running a powerful organization, she was always known as “Mrs. Donald Mclean.” So why is she not buried with her husband? This presentation details the history of the McLean Lot in the Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx and provides a theory of why a wife and mother would be separated from her husband and children, buried in her hometown of Frederick, Maryland.