Have you seen the recent wave of vandalism in historic cemeteries like Grantsville or Fillmore in the news? Or have you ever used the most accurate and verified burial database in Utah? If so, the Utah Cemetery Program was part of the solution to fix the tombstones or improve access to burial data. The Utah Cemetery Program is part of the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) within the Department of Cultural and Community Engagement at the State of Utah. The program offers many services to interested Utahns and cemeteries throughout the state. 

The cemetery program connects with towns, cities, and service districts to assist them with any questions or guidance they may need to care for cemeteries and their records. The cemetery program offers a small yearly grant to help digitize burial records, GIS mapping, surveying, and preservation. Requests and needs outstrip the regular grant fund by 5:1. In 2024, the Utah legislature approved an additional one-time supplemental grant money for the program, which is now mostly spent, and supported 32 cemeteries with various projects. In most cases, the grant is going to rural communities and has helped cemeteries get their records off paper and into functional digital platforms. 

Before and after photos of repaired headstones at the historic cemetery in Heber City.

In addition to records, the program assists cemeteries and educates the public on proper preservation methods. We conduct on-site workshops with interested parties such as the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers, local historical organizations, and veteran groups to teach them how to properly clean historic headstones. We assist cemetery personnel with more advanced needs, such as resetting leaning or fallen headstones and repairing broken stones using proper preservation practices. Teaching the cemetery staff gives them the tools to do this work in the future and treat their historic stones and tackle health and safety issues when stones fall or tip. 

As mentioned earlier, we can even provide direct support in times of need. In Fillmore and Grantsville, the cemetery program was able to work with the local community and help to properly repair those historic headstones that were vandalized. In the past year, the program has assisted 17 cemeteries with preservation requests throughout the state. 

Finally, the program operates a cemetery and burial database. Under a state mandate, we collect burial information from all of Utah’s cemeteries and upload that data into a publicly accessible database. Currently, there are more than 740,000 burial records in the database. For smaller cities and towns, this database can be an avenue for them to make their records accessible to a wider audience. You can also access an interactive map of the 700 cemeteries and isolated burial sites throughout the state. 

We take great pride in helping communities protect their historic cemeteries while providing the most comprehensive database in the world for finding where your ancestors are buried so their stories can be remembered for future generations. Please contact Amy Barry (amybarry@utah.gov) and visit our website for more information and to access our databases.