The American Way of Death Revisited

About the Author

Jessica Mitford—of the notorious Mitford clan—was one of the most celebrated muckraking journalists of our time. Among her books are Daughters and Rebels, The Trial of Dr. Spock, and Poison Penmanship: The Gentle Art of Muckraking. Until her death in 1996, she lived in Oakland, California, with her husband, the labor lawyer Robert Treuhaft.

Also by JESSICA MITFORD

Daughters and Rebels

The American Way of Death

The Trial of Dr. Spock

Kind and Usual Punishment: The Prison Business

A Fine Old Conflict

Poison Penmanship: The Gentle Art of Muckraking

Faces of Philip: A Memoir of Philip Toynbee

Grace Had an English Heart

The American Way of Birth

Copyright

FIRST VINTAGE BOOKS EDITION, JANUARY 2000

Copyright © 1998 by The Estate of Jessica Mitford

Copyright © 1963, 1978 by Jessica Mitford

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, in 1998, and in very different form as The American Way of Death by Simon & Schuster, New York, in 1963, and revised in 1978.

Vintage Books and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

The Library of Congress has cataloged the Knopf edition as follows:

Mitford, Jessica, 1917–1996

The American way of death revisited / by Jessica Mitford. — 1st ed.

p. cm.

1. Undertakers and undertaking—United States. 2. Funeral rites and ceremonies—Economic aspects—United States. 3. Mitford, Jessica, 1917–1996, The American Way of Death.

I. Title.

HD9999.U53U554    1998

338.4?736375?0973—dc21    97-49349

eISBN: 978-0-307-80939-1

www.vintagebooks.com

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Notes

1

See chapter 20, “New Hope for the Dead,” and this page for a list of nonprofit societies that will provide advice and information to nonmembers as well as to members.

2

While most of the sales techniques described in this chapter have not changed, the prices quoted should be increased tenfold to reflect current costs. The average mortuary bill in 1961, $400 to $750, is now, according to the National Funeral Directors Association’s latest survey, $4,700 ($7,800 with cemetery charges included).

3

Current crematory charges run from $200 to $350. In the Santa Rosa area today, Mr. Rhoades would have to pay $1,000 or more to move his friend’s body from the rest home to the crematory.

4

The funeral people, ever alert to fill a need, have come up with a casket that can be written on. The York “Expressions” casket, introduced at the 1996 convention of the National Funeral Directors Association, features “a smooth surface with a special coating on which those who gather may write one last farewell to the departed.” The caskets come with a set of permanent markers and a Memorial Guide that rashly invites “those who gather” to “make known their hidden thoughts.” As happens when chums are invited to autograph a schoolmate’s surgical cast, there will predictably be the occasional nonconformist who is unable to resist the temptation to use the permanent marker to express his hidden thoughts, however derogatory.

5

Elgin is no more, nor is Merit; they along with many other manufacturers, have been swallowed up by the industry’s Big Three: Batesville, Aurora, and York. The number of casket manufacturers has plummeted from 520 in 1976 to fewer than 100 primary producers today.

6

A sealer is a casket with a gasket.