The Public Burial Ground, as it was referred to by the colonial town council, was officially the cemetery of Christ Church parish until 1789, when it became a city property for the use of all Protestant sects, with separate burial grounds established for Jews, African Americans, Catholics, and indigents. By the early nineteenth century Colonial Park Cemetery’s 500 × 500–foot walled enclosure presented a significant impediment to the regularized development of new wards in the South Common. It may be that the 140-foot width of Oglethorpe Avenue was dictated by the northern edge of the cemetery. In 1853 the Old Cemetery (as it came to be called) was closed to new burials, and replaced by Laurel Grove Cemetery (11.9) on the southwestern edge of town. Several graves were moved to Bonaventure Cemetery (17.1) in 1873 with the hope of opening up this land to new development, but a scant number were relocated before opposition curtailed that plan. Initiatives to maintain and preserve Colonial Park Cemetery prompted the City to declare it a public park in 1896 and commission its relandscaping a year later. The Daughters of the American Revolution built the corner gate in 1915. The Trustees’ Garden Club completed a comprehensive three-year restoration of the cemetery in the late 1960s and continues to supervise its maintenance to the present day.