A blue plaque with a QR code that links to a webpage with heritage information has been placed at the “Cementerio Parque Bosques de Santa Catalina,” historically known as the Lomas de Zamora Dissidents Cemetery, one of the most important memorial sites for the Scottish community and for Argentines who fell fighting for the Allies during the First and Second World Wars.

The initiative was part of the project “Cartografías Íntimas en Comunidad” (“Intimate Cartographies within the Community”) directed by Dr Mónica Szurmuk and organized by the Universidad de San Martín (UNSAM), CONICET (National Council for Scientific and Technical Research), and funded by the University of Bristol in England, with support from the Heritage Department of the Municipality of Lomas de Zamora.

The history of the cemetery dates back to the 19th century, when the site was part of the Santa Catalina ranch, then part of the Oak Farm estate owned by native of Maine-US banker Wilson Jacobs III. It was acquired in 1884 by the Ferrocarril de la Provincia company to install the Llavallol station on its branch line from La Plata to Cañuelas. In 1890, the branch line passed into the hands of F.C. del Sud, which modified the layout, leaving the site vacant. This encouraged the growing British community in Lomas to campaign for the donation of the land for the creation of a non-Catholic cemetery. The project was commissioned to a local resident, the architect Walter Bassett-Smith and it was inaugurated in 1898. In 1921, after the First World War, the Scottish architect James Smith, resident in Lomas, designed the current chapel/memorial on the site, dedicating it to the Argentine residents who fell in the First World War, and later to those who fell in the Second World War as well.

More information available here: https://cartografiasintimasencomunidad.unsam.edu.ar/cementerio-de-disidentes/