Woodlawn's Veterans Day Week Belongs to the Cemetery, and Its One Tour Starts at the Same Hour as the Bronx Parade

Veterans Day week in Woodlawn centers on Woodlawn Cemetery, at the end of the 4 line. This year the Woodlawn Conservancy's only public event of the week is a World War I walking tour on Sunday, November 8, at noon. That is the same hour the Bronx Veterans Day Parade starts on the other side of the borough. Both Sunday and Wednesday, November 11, fall on days the cemetery's administration office is closed. For anyone in Woodlawn Heights, that sets the shape of the week. It works if you plan a few days ahead.

Two events want the same Sunday noon

The Woodlawn Conservancy's tours and events page lists the World War I Veterans of Woodlawn Walking Tour for Sunday, November 8, 2026, at 12:00 PM, "in honor of Veteran's Day." The city's events calendar has the Bronx Veterans Day Parade on the same date, from 12 p.m. to 2 p.m., on Lafayette Avenue between East Tremont Avenue and Swinton Avenue. That route meets East Tremont Avenue, the corridor in our Throggs Neck fall calendar post. The tour starts at the north end of the 4 line.

Since both start at noon, you can't do both on Sunday. The citywide parade comes three days later, on Wednesday, November 11, from 12:30 to 4 p.m. The city's 2026 New York City Veterans Day Parade listing gives West 24th Street between Seventh and Sixth Avenues as the location. So a Woodlawn household could walk the cemetery on Sunday and catch the Manhattan parade on Wednesday. The week has room for both, as long as Sunday goes to the cemetery.

Why this Sunday is the last one on the cemetery's calendar

The Conservancy says it schedules public walking and trolley tours in spring, summer and fall. Its 2026 fall season ended with two tours on Saturday, October 31. Where Harlem Rests was a complimentary trolley tour led by Project Historian Eric K. Washington, with stops at the graves of Madam C.J. Walker and A'Lelia Walker. The Fall Foliage Trolley Tour was led by Herb Landmann of The Davey Tree Expert Company. Both were listed as at capacity. The World War I walk on November 8 is the only date on the calendar after them.

Those October tours filled up, and this is the last public tour of the year, so it's sensible to book the November tour early. General admission is $20, and students, seniors and Conservancy members pay $15, through the Conservancy's ticket page. The page's top date field and the Conservancy's main calendar both say Sunday, November 8.

Who leads it and who you will meet

Kevin C. Fitzpatrick leads the walk. He is the author of "World War I New York: A Guide to the City's Enduring Ties to the Great War." The Conservancy's listing frames the tour with a line from General John J. Pershing, commander of the American Expeditionary Forces:

"Time will not dim the glory of their deeds."

The tour description promises a walk past the graves and memorials of World War I veterans, both men and women. On the route are enlisted men who served in trench warfare, aviators who flew biplanes, a member of the Harlem Hellfighters, and immigrants who were drafted and served their new country. The listing also says the cemetery holds veterans and dependents from every conflict back to the American Revolution. That makes the WWI walk one slice of a much longer military history inside the gates.

The ground the tour covers

The cemetery published its own account of this history for the war's centennial. Woodlawn's WWI centennial post explains that most American war dead came home years after the armistice, thanks to the Gold Star Mothers, who campaigned to bring their sons back. When those bodies reached New York in the early 1920s, Woodlawn directed families to the Butternut, Primrose and Arbutus plots. The post says that is where many monuments with symbols of service stand.

Look closely at the markers. Bronze medallions with crossed rifles mark infantry service, and large bronze stars mark veterans' graves. Woodlawn is a private cemetery, so families bought their own markers and bronze details to match their family lots. That is why the inscriptions vary so much. Some say "Killed in Action," some say "Made the Supreme Sacrifice," and others list rank and branch.

Some of the stones mark no burial at all. The same post describes cenotaphs, memorials for soldiers buried near the battlefields where they died, put up by families who left them there. Several soldiers killed in the Argonne Forest at the very end of the war are remembered at Woodlawn this way.

The centennial post also names three men connected to the war. For years afterward, Columbia University students made a tradition of visiting the grave of John Purroy Mitchel, the former New York mayor who died in a flying accident. Vernon Castle, the well-known dancer who also flew, and Hugh Campbell, a recipient of the Croix de Guerre, are memorialized at Woodlawn too. The Conservancy hasn't published the November 8 route, so treat these names as the cemetery's own history, not a promised list of stops.

Wednesday the 11th: open grounds, closed office

On Veterans Day itself, Woodlawn's Plan a Visit page lists the grounds as open seven days a week, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The administration office is closed Sundays and on ten holidays, and Veterans Day is one of them. So the office is closed on both of the week's key days, the tour Sunday and the holiday Wednesday.

That matters most for anyone who wants to take photos. Woodlawn allows photography for personal use, but asks visitors to stop at the administration office and request a photography form first. The office keeps weekday hours of 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and Saturday hours of 8:30 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. If you plan to photograph a family marker on Sunday or on the 11th, Saturday, November 7, is the last time before then that the office is open. The site also asks visitors to call ahead in bad weather or high winds, at (718) 920-0500.

Getting there depends on which entrance you need. The cemetery's own directions:

1. 4 train to Woodlawn, the last stop. From the base of the station, walk about half a block. The Jerome Avenue entrance is on the right, and it's where the November 8 tour starts.
2. 2 or 5 train to 233rd Street. Walk three blocks downhill along 233rd Street and cross Webster Avenue. The entrance is on the left.
3. Metro-North Harlem Line local toward North White Plains. Get off at Woodlawn station and turn right at the top of the stairs. The Webster office is across the street to the left.
4. Main entrance. 4199 Webster Avenue, Bronx, NY 10470.

The tour meets at Jerome Ave & Bainbridge Ave, so the 4 train is the simplest way to get there. The main entrance is a separate gate on Webster Avenue.

After noon on Katonah Avenue

The walk starts at lunchtime, so most people will be looking for food afterward. Two Katonah Avenue spots in Woodlawn Heights have current, published details.

• Rambling House, 4292 Katonah Avenue. This year the Woodlawn Heights Taxpayers & Community Association held its October 12 membership meeting here, and Halloween Bingo & Brew on October 23. The pub's events page lists the address and phone number, 718-798-4510. Sunday hours aren't posted there, so call before you go.
• Mughal Curry Spot, 4268 Katonah Avenue. The restaurant's site lists Sunday hours of 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. and offers takeout and delivery. That makes it the easier pick if you want to take food home after the walk.

The association's events page is also the best place to watch for what Woodlawn Heights schedules next. Early voting for the 2026 general election, which it lists from October 24 through November 1, is over by the time the tour runs. If you'd rather spend Sunday outdoors before the gates close at 4:30, our post on Van Cortlandt Park's fall season covers the park next door to Woodlawn.

The plan that fits the week: book a ticket for Sunday's noon walk now, stop by the cemetery office on Saturday the 7th if you'll want to take photos, and keep Wednesday the 11th for the grounds or the Manhattan parade.

At Legacy Group, we follow the north Bronx calendar the same way our neighbors here do, from the Jerome Avenue gate to the last booth on Katonah Avenue. If you have questions about the blocks around the cemetery or what's coming to Woodlawn Heights this winter, reach out to our team. Find your piece of the Emerald Coast, or your corner of the Bronx, with people who know the details.