A 160-acre rural-style cemetery designed in 1859 by Howard Daniels — home to the Comfort Tyler pyramid, the Haggerty Lion, and a child's grave known to locals as the Devil's Chair.
940 Comstock Avenue, Syracuse, NY 13210
Age
All Ages
Cost
Free
Free public access during posted hours; Onondaga Historical Association Ghostwalk tours are ticketed seasonal events.
Access
Limited Access
Rolling hills, paved drives, and unpaved paths through wooded sections
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1859 · Rural Cemetery Movement · Howard Daniels Landscape Architecture · 19th-Century Picturesque Design · Syracuse Civic History
Syracuse residents purchased the initial 72 acres for Oakwood Cemetery in 1857, adding 20 more acres the following year. Howard Daniels (1815–1863), a New York City landscape gardener already known for his work on rural cemeteries throughout the Northeast, was hired to design the grounds. Daniels delivered a plan in the picturesque style — winding drives following the natural contours of the wooded hills, water features, and family plots placed to take advantage of long sight lines rather than rigid grid patterns.
A crew of sixty laborers, working without large-scale earth-moving equipment, prepared the 92-acre site in roughly two months, primarily by thinning and grouping the existing oak forest from which the cemetery took its name. The cemetery was formally dedicated in November 1859, and the first interment — Mrs. Nellie G. Williamson — took place on November 8 of that year. Subsequent purchases brought the total grounds to 160 acres.
Oakwood is regarded as one of the most intact examples of Daniels' rural-cemetery work and is the last of the fifteen rural cemeteries he designed before his death in 1863. The cemetery contains a number of notable monuments, including the Comfort Tyler pyramid in Dedication Valley (a relocated family memorial for one of Onondaga County's earliest settlers, who served under Aaron Burr) and the Haggerty Lion, a stone lion erected by an artist family in memory of fourteen-year-old Michael Charles Haggerty, killed in a 1974 auto accident.
The cemetery is adjacent to Syracuse University and is operated by the Oakwood Cemeteries of Syracuse non-profit. The Historic Oakwood Cemetery Preservation Association (HOCPA) supports preservation and interpretation programming. Notable burials include several Syracuse University founders, Civil War officers, and civic leaders.
Sources
Oakwood's paranormal lore is curated more thoroughly than most cemeteries in the region, thanks to the Onondaga Historical Association's seasonal Ghostwalk tours. Those tours — running annually for over two decades — work from a documented script of cemetery legends, several of which are repeated in CNY Central's 'Haunted CNY' coverage and on Upstate Unearthed.
'The Hermit' is described as the spirit of a man who died of a broken heart and is seen wandering in the older sections, most frequently near the Haggerty Lion monument. The Haggerty Lion itself dates from the 1970s — erected by a younger brother in memory of Michael Charles Haggerty, killed at age fourteen in a 1974 auto accident, with the surviving brother later studying art at Syracuse University. The lion is a popular stop on the Ghostwalk and is referenced in local TikTok and Facebook coverage of the cemetery.
A 'Black Lab' canine apparition is described as having appeared after a stone statue of a family's pet dog was removed from a grave; the spectral dog is reported by visitors walking the older sections at dusk. 'The Devil's Chair' is a child's grave (the specific marker is identified on Ghost Trail tour materials) noted for repeated reports of orb activity in photographs taken at the site.
The most reported sightings — white lights and orbs — cluster around the Comfort Tyler pyramid in Dedication Valley, where the remains of Comfort Tyler and his family were relocated from earlier burial sites into the elaborate pyramid memorial. The CNY Ghost Hunters and other regional paranormal groups have investigated the older sections, and Upstate Unearthed's Live Oaks and Dead Folks travelogue describes the cemetery as one of the most active sites the writer visited in Central New York.
The Oakwood Cemetery board and HOCPA treat the lore respectfully — emphasizing historical interpretation and preservation over sensationalism — and the Ghostwalk is structured as costumed living-history rather than as a haunted attraction.
Notable Entities
Media Appearances
Walk the 160-acre rural-style grounds designed by Howard Daniels. Notable monuments include the Comfort Tyler pyramid in Dedication Valley, the Haggerty Lion, and ornate Victorian-era mausoleums and family plots in the older sections.
Each fall the Onondaga Historical Association leads ticketed Ghostwalk tours through Oakwood, with costumed interpreters portraying notable burials and sharing the cemetery's local legends — including the Hermit near the Haggerty Lion, the Devil's Chair child grave, and the Black Lab.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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