In 1804, when it opened, Père-Lachaise cemetery struggled to win over Parisians, who considered it too far out of the way; how many plots were there still only three years later, in 1807?
The answer
13 plots in 1804, 44 in 1805, 49 in 1806, then only 62 in 1807: Parisians simply shunned the cemetery. It took the transfer of several illustrious figures in the 1810s to turn the tide; by the mid-1820s, there were tens of thousands of plots.
This question belongs to the “Unusual Stories” series of the Père-Lachaise quiz: ten questions, a story behind every right answer.