The year 2022 did not end well for our friends and fellow volunteers with the Central Point Cemetery. Sometime on or around Tuesday, December 13, vandals entered the cemetery grounds and proceeded to topple more than two dozen headstones and family monuments. Unfortunately, this was the second act of major vandalism that has occurred in this Pioneer Cemetery, the last in 2011 when some fifty monuments were pushed over with many breaking into pieces.

The City of Central Point took over management of the cemetery in early 2022, and Dave Jacob, Park Planner, has been working very hard on a management plan for the cemetery and developing a volunteer workforce to help care for the cemetery grounds. One of which is an Adopt-A-Block program similar to ours in the Jacksonville Cemetery. The Friends of Jacksonville’s Historic Cemetery have been working with the Central Point Cemetery providing guidance and assistance when and where we can and will continue to do so and help them though this crisis. Ironically, we held two workshops in the Central Point Cemetery, one on April 6, 2022, for City employees and more recently on October 15, 2022, for volunteers, on how to safely repair and restore headstones and monuments. At the time this training was to focus on existing stones that required attention, many from the 2011 vandalism and not another twenty-four toppled stones.

Shortly after news of the vandalism started to spread, I received a number of calls, emails and people approaching me while in the cemetery all expressing concern for our own cemetery. While Jacksonville has had small, isolated cases of vandalism, we have been most fortunate with the last major cases having been reported in the mid 1950’s and 1960’s. Sadly, our historic cemeteries along with religious sites remain targets for this kind of behavior. The majority of us find the destruction of a cemetery in this manner difficult to understand but it does happen and is not always done by children or young adults.

While we may not be able to prevent our cemetery from this kind of vandalism, there are a number of things that we, the City of Jacksonville, the Jacksonville Cemetery Commission, and the Friends of Jacksonville’s Historic Cemetery, have done and continue to do to deter this from happening:

  • First and foremost is maintaining the grounds to keep that well cared for appearance letting others know we take pride in our cemetery and have a strong workforce of volunteers. Things like Community Clean-up Days, our Adopt-A-Block program with signs posted in all those blocks that have been adopted, monthly marker cleaning workshops and our restoration team who repair headstones and other cemetery fixtures all of which show the cemetery is being well cared for.
  • The first set of rules and regulations for the cemetery were established by the Cemetery Commission in 2011 and updated in 2014. These rules and regulations are posted at the entrance to the cemetery as well as within the grounds. They are also available in a printed brochure style format.
  • Daily drive through of the cemetery grounds by the Jacksonville Police Department who at the end of the day, do a final drive through and secure the gates.
  • The presence of so many volunteers working in the cemetery at various hours and days of the week also serves as a deterrent.
  • The various programs and tours offered by the FOJHC that share the rich history of the cemetery and its residents with visitors help to promote its popularity as a historical destination.
  • Those of you, whom I refer to as “our regulars,” who walk the cemetery grounds on a regular basis, also help to deter bad behavior within the grounds. We sincerely appreciate your eyes and ears on the property in our absence.
  • The installation of cameras within the cemetery grounds and signs posted that the grounds are under surveillance. We plan to place additional cameras early in the New Year.

Towards this endeavor our volunteers donated a total of 2,588 hours of labor during 2022. This figure does not include the hours our Adopt-A-Block volunteers contributed caring for their block/s as they work on their individual schedules keeping the program informal and not competitive.