IT’S BEEN A CHILLY and wet winter so far, but spring is on the way and will be here before we know it!
Meanwhile, the first scheduled event of the Friends of Jacksonville’s Historic Cemetery’s 2025 season, our customary Spring Community Cemetery Clean-Up Day, March 22nd, […]
WELCOME TO 2025… we hope you enjoyed the holiday season!
We begin by highlighting some key accomplishments of the Friends of Jacksonville’s Historic Cemetery from the year just passed, with thanks to all those whose efforts made them possible:
History Programs:
• Five History Saturday talks and tours, coordinated and emceed by Ellen Martin:
LAST MONTH we highlighted the September conclusion of our History Saturday in the Cemetery program (second Saturdays, May through September) and planned to write this month about the conclusion of the Marker Cleaning Workshop program (third Saturdays, same months). It was quite a finale! Just before the last workshop, Christmas […]
THE FRIENDS’ final History Saturday in the Cemetery presentation of 2024 took place on another beautiful September morning with Fall in the air and an audience eager to hear the sequel to June’s talk on Courtship and Love Customs in Early Jacksonville.
Continuing the theme, this time with Love and Marriage in […]
CEMETERY HAPPENINGS!—Our August History Saturday presentation, “Let Us Entertain You – Entertainment and Leisure in 1800s Jacksonville…from bloomers to bicycles,” brought an enthusiastic group of visitors to the cemetery on a beautiful summer morning to hear another interesting chapter of local history!
In period costume and using historic photos to illustrate their […]
JULY IN THE JACKSONVILLE HISTORIC CEMETERY saw warmer weather, and, with it, an onslaught of Madrone leaves often obscuring the markers our visitors seek when touring or paying respects to departed family and friends. While city staff does their best to keep up, all of us as Adopt-A-Block “parents” need to […]
THE FRIENDS OF JACKSONVILLE’S HISTORIC CEMETERY’S “2nd Saturday” activities for June began with a wonderful turnout for the plaque dedication in honor of Dirk Siedlecki. Located on the north side of the Sexton’s Tool House in an area beautifully landscaped by the Jacksonville Garden Club, the boulder-mounted plaque provides a brief […]
OUR BUSY MAY schedule got off to a rainy start with the cancellation of the Pre-Memorial Day Cemetery Clean-Up due to unusually cold weather and nearly an inch of unexpected rainfall! Fortunately, members of the cemetery team from Jacksonville Public Works had been mowing the paths and open spaces in anticipation […]
ON A RAINY MORNING IN APRIL, Cemetery Sexton Rick Shields, together with members of the Friends board and the Jacksonville Public Works Department staff, placed a monument in the cemetery commemorating the life and work of Dirk Siedlecki, late founder of the Friends of Jacksonville’s Historic Cemetery and long-time President of […]
WITH “APRIL SHOWERS” behind us, it’s time for “May flowers” and the beginning of a busy season of outdoor events at Jacksonville’s Historic Cemetery! Our recurring History Saturday in the Cemetery and Marker Cleaning Workshop programs, plus the annual Pre-Memorial Day Community Cemetery Clean-up and Flags for our Veterans events make […]
APRIL IS A QUIET MONTH in the cemetery but also one of anticipation and transition from the cold of winter to the blooms of spring and, eventually, the warmth and long days of summer. By the time you read this, we will hopefully have completed our first Community […]
ONCE AGAIN, I’m happy to report that we’ve come through another cold, dark and (mercifully) wet winter and, depending on when you read this, spring is either here or about to be!
With Easter coming a bit early this year, we’ve scheduled the Friends’ Spring Cemetery Clean-Up for Saturday, March 16th, just […]
2023 REPORT CARD & LOOKING AHEAD—We hope you enjoyed the holiday season and found some quiet time to reflect on what’s right in our increasingly hectic world. For the Friends of Jacksonville’s Historic Cemetery (FOJHC), the past year was one of transition, and we’re grateful that, with the help of our […]
After Mountain Iron Works recently put the finishing touches on the installation of custom iron fencing to replace the original surround of the Pape/Prim block (Masonic 273) that had been stolen, some new details came to light. First, while the Friends of Jacksonville’s Historic Cemetery contract with Mountain specified a […]
New Fences and Faces!—We recently highlighted phase 1 of the FOJHC’s restoration of the Pape/Prim block (Masonic 273) … but there’s more to the story! The block was once surrounded by an iron fence atop the sandstone curbing and between the bollards, with a matching gate at the entrance. With no known photographs showing the […]
Early October is normally the time “a small army of volunteers” is working non-stop to put the finishing touches on stories, costumes, and logistical details for another chapter of Meet the Pioneers, our special Living History program where costumed Players share the rich history of Jacksonville and the Rogue Valley on two evenings of one-hour […]
In each of my eighteen summers in Jacksonville, there has always come a morning sometime in mid-September when suddenly there’s a slight crispness in the air, and it becomes clear that our typical hot summer days will soon be giving way to the cooler weather of early fall.
September also marks this year’s final sessions of […]
A key mission of the Friends of Jacksonville’s Historic Cemetery is the restoration of damaged monuments in the cemetery. Many headstones, and even entire blocks, have been restored over the years. A recent example is the Pape/Prim block (Masonic 273), restoration of which began in 2022. Project completion is expected by year-end.
Paine Page Prim was […]
With winter behind us, beautiful spring weather provided the opportunity for two significant community-wide cemetery clean-ups. Thanks to the help of some seventy volunteers, including individuals, entire families, and members of religious, fraternal, and service organizations, much was accomplished with the first clean-up on April 29th. Then, a second clean-up, on May 20th, put finishing […]
Honoring Veterans in May—May is the heart of springtime in Jacksonville and typically a very beautiful month in our historic cemetery. With winter behind us, and Memorial Day coming at month-end ready to mark the beginning of summer, May offers one more opportunity to make sure the cemetery is tidied-up for the outdoor season ahead.
May […]
By the time you read this, the Cemetery should be looking good and almost ready for spring, thanks to last month’s Community Spring Clean-Up Day and the ongoing Adopt-A-Block program where some 200 volunteers maintain “adopted” cemetery blocks—on their own schedules, as time permits.
We shared the news, last month, of the untimely passing of Friends […]