Death and talking about death wasn’t always something we pushed aside and ignored. Before the Civil War, families laid the corpses of their loved ones on the floor in the homes as part of the grieving process. This allowed mourners to visit with the family as they paid their respects to the dead. And, the reason for visiting was right there, out in the open.

That all changed with a business opportunity, though, says Craig Klugman, a bioethicist and medical anthropologist at DePaul University.