Here in mausoleum-packed Salem Fields Cemetery, cut off from the free-ranging air currents that afforded swift passage across the wide-open plains of Cypress Hills National Cemetery, our itinerant balloon friend has become rather sluggish.

The eponymous Fox of Rupert Murdoch's entertainment empire

Austrian-born Joseph B. Greenhut was the second man in Chicago to enlist for service in the Civil War following President Lincoln's call for volunteers in 1861, and he rose to the rank of captain before resigning his commission in 1864. He became quite wealthy after the war, establishing the world's largest distillery in Peoria, Illinois (the "Whiskey Capital of the World") and later acquiring control of a major department store company in Manhattan. A 1912 history of Peoria attributed his success in business to his "marked ability to coordinate interests and to combine seemingly diverse factions into a harmonious whole. It is said that difficulties vanish before him as mist before the morning sun." In 1909, he purchased Shadow Lawn, a magnificent New Jersey estate (photos) that was used by President Wilson as his Summer White House (video) for the last two months of his 1916 re-election campaign.

Lip Pike was the first Jewish baseball star. He led the National Association (the first professional baseball league and the predecessor of the National League) in home runs in its first three seasons, 1871-73.

Salem Fields Cemetery, along with neighboring Cypress Hills National Cemetery, belongs to a huge cluster of 17 contiguous cemeteries located along the middle of the border between Brooklyn and Queens.

Another custom school crossing sign

There have only been 19 two-time recipients of the Medal of Honor (the country's highest military honor), and three of them are buried in Cypress Hills National Cemetery: Daniel Daly ("Come on, you sons of bitches, do you want to live forever?"), John Cooper, and Louis Williams (a.k.a. Ludwig Andreas Olsen).

An officers' section of Cypress Hills National Cemetery and a line of mausoleums in Salem Fields Cemetery

It came right up to me and then jumped the fence into Salem Fields Cemetery.

Horseshoer

I just realized that each half of that word contains the same letters.

The enormous mausoleums of neighboring Salem Fields Cemetery stand in stark contrast to the uniform rows of modest headstones here at Cypress Hills National Cemetery.

The plaque reads: "The markers in this memorial area honor veterans whose remains have not been recovered or identified, were buried at sea, donated to science, or cremated and the ashes scattered."

This cross is dedicated to the 25 French sailors who died while on duty in American waters during the flu pandemic in the fall of 1918 around the end of World War I. 22 of the sailors are buried here; the bodies of the other three were returned to France.