please empty your brain below
"I decided against taking photos of what lay beyond, although not everybody on the tour was so restrained."
I think you may then have missed the point of the festival, demystifying death and all that goes with it; it's just a workplace after all.
A shame as your photos do often help illuminate your pieces.

Graham Reaper | 30.06.19 - 7:24 a.m. | #

I've donated my body to science. When I die it should go to the local medical school. Do people find that more difficult to accept than cremation?

popartist | 30.06.19 - 7:30 a.m. | #

The nearby five way Junction where the road from Chiswick Bridge meets the South Circular is known as Chalker’s Corner after the undertakers which used to be there. Which I think is a nice connection to a post on a crematorium.

Robert Butlin | 30.06.19 - 8:27 a.m. | #

Does "with space for four roller-topped trolleys up one end." mean that 4 bodies are burnt at the same time? If so the ashes given to relatives may be a bit mixed up....

Doug Robinson | 30.06.19 - 8:43 a.m. | #

One funeral I attended had a novel timetable. Close family gathering in crem chapel at 0900, and interment of ashes the same day at 1500 at local church followed by tea with ham sandwiches. Worked well.
Her sister, though, who died a few years later, was going to be the same, but it didn't work out, as the furnace had a glitch, which wrecked the timetable.

Malcolm | 30.06.19 - 8:50 a.m. | #

Many years ago I made an educational programme for TV about death and dying and found that the funeral processes were what my audience was most interested in. We approached a crematorium about filming and they were most cooperative, keen to dispel the myth that everyone's ashes are 'all mixed up'.

So we showed the whole process as DG described, with the furnace and the raking and the crushing, but also the punctilious name checking at every stage, from the arrival of the coffin from above to the placing of the labelled Tupperware box of 'ashes' on the shelf for collection.

ActonMan | 30.06.19 - 10:00 a.m. | #

I think I must have seen @ActonMan's film.

B | 30.06.19 - 10:37 a.m. | #

Interesting piece thank you. Until recently I had always assumed the coffin itself was not put in the furnace but got re-used. Only when a brother died and I researched further did I realise that it does indeed get "cremated" along with the body. Seems a bit of a waste in this age of recycling.

Tim | 30.06.19 - 11:10 a.m. | #

The Code of Cremation Practice forbids the opening of the coffin once it has arrived at the crematorium.

Wooden coffins burn with a slow, even heat, which speeds up the process so the cremators require less fuel. Cardboard coffins, or no coffin at all, would be less environmentally-friendly overall.

diamond geezer | Homepage | 30.06.19 - 11:22 a.m. | #

When I visited a crematorium the staff were so insistent, and so often, that the ashes were not mixed that I assumed that they were.
The drawer full of metal hips and knees was fascinating.

mikeS | 30.06.19 - 12:16 p.m. | #

In answer to South London Man, I do not know about Mortlake, but if you want to visit a similar facility, the South West Middlesex Crematorium near Hounslow, normally has an open day every year. You have missed it this year at it was in early June.

John | 30.06.19 - 12:22 p.m. | #

Fascinating post and especially the comment about "eco friendly" coffins not being the caseafter all!

Cornish Cockney | 30.06.19 - 3:12 p.m. | #

And what happens to any gold fillings or rings?

Temp | 30.06.19 - 6:00 p.m. | #

Most interesting, thank you. I shall look out for City of London Crematorium tours - I hope they do them.

Lorraine | 30.06.19 - 6:26 p.m. | #

I think rings are removed by the funeral directors and given to the family, unless they request otherwise. I think any other metal is raked out with the remains and either picked out or reduced to powder with everything else.

Although, as a TV producer. I found this to be a fascinating process, as did my teenage audience, many people more immediately affected not unreasonably prefer not to know what happens once the curtains are drawn, the music plays and the congregation files out.

ActonMan | 30.06.19 - 6:37 p.m. | #

My dear late father, anticipating his final journey to Mortlake Crem, mentioned that he found it amusing that it was next to what he described in traditional terms as the local authority rubbish tip.

Bob L-S | 30.06.19 - 9:27 p.m. | #

An interesting post. To me, once a person dies, the body is just a shell to be disposed of by any suitable (and cheap!) means. If there is anything that lives on, I think it's what is in the memory of the people that knew the deceased.

There are some interesting videos on YT showing the detailed cremation process from start to finishn

Rogmi | 01.07.19 - 3:02 p.m. | #

>> I confess I did surreptitiously wonder which of the three chambers Margaret Thatcher had combusted in

Surely she was staked at a crossroads?

Agent X | 01.07.19 - 9:18 p.m. | #

Popartist - That's if they do accept it once you're dead. Quite a few people try and donate their bodies after their death and the prospective recipient organisations can be quite particular

Agent X | 01.07.19 - 9:21 p.m. | #

Popartist: It will go to the hospital you assigned it to providing it's not Xmas or a long public holiday or been subject to a post-mortem. And that your relatives know of your plans and can contact the correct hospital.
There are many reasons they won't accept your body so also best have a back-up plan (the Co-op do cheap, non-attended cremations).

MartinOfHolcombe | 20.07.19 - 10:43 a.m. | #











TridentScan v2.10.0 | Privacy Policy