J.L. Hudson’s Grave

For a century, “meet me at Hudson’s” needed no further explanation in Detroit. Joseph L. Hudson opened his clothing store downtown in 1881 and built it into one of the largest department stores on earth — 25 stories, the nation’s biggest flag, the Thanksgiving parade that became the city’s own. The flagship was imploded in 1998 and a towering successor now rises on the same block, but the man who started it all rests here at Woodlawn.

He never married; his name carried on through his nieces and nephews — one of whom, Eleanor Clay, married Edsel Ford and lies not far away. A quintessential Detroit institution, memorialized in stone. On our list.