The City of Mount Airy completed a Cemetery Information Update Project in 2000. The purpose of the project was to find, document and update as much information as possible about our cemetery. As you might imagine after a 150 years information can become lost, especially as several generations of employees have handled things differently.

We started by creating a new digital map of the cemetery  in AutoCAD that brings the cemetery maps up to date. Previous maps of the cemetery dated back to the 1920’s, 40’s and 60’s. Many of these maps were heavily damaged by past foods of our Public Works building on Riverside drive.

We have created multiple layers of the map that allow us to display the original numbering system or any new numbers that were altered in to better define the cemetery. This helps preserve the historical information in the current paper maps that are deteriorating.

A volunteer, Mr. Reavis Lyons spent several months in the cemetery recording all the names and other information off headstones. Several paid temporary employees entered in the section, lot, row and plot information into our new cemetery tracking software. The new software allows us to more accurately keep track occupants, owners, certificates and even scanned documents.

Mr. James Helton, Ms. Sharon Carter and other employees then went back to the cemetery and matched the list of names with the new map to document exact locations. After this information had been entered into the database, reports with the matched information were created, then taken back to the cemetery to be double checked for correctness. Final corrections were made.

The cards that once housed cemetery information in the finance department, have been scanned into the computer for historical use and validation of claims.

Now that all this information is in the computerized database we can easily find answers to questions like:

Where is this person buried?

How many plots does this person own?

How many people are buried in the cemetery?

How many plots does the city own. In section 22? Etc.

If you have any questions concerning Oakdale Cemetery, please contact Michella Huff at (336) 786-3593

If you are aware of any unmarked graves, cremations or other information that our recent information project may have missed please contact us.