Headstones are, perhaps too often, taken for granted. These pieces of history are strewn across the landscape of the United States in various states of maintenance and repair and often they become illegible after just a half century or so. In many cases even families with the best of intentions leave graves of their loved ones entirely unmarked by a headstone for decades after the deaths. So, with all this neglect so common in modern society, it stands to reason that headstones may be a bit of a mystery for those who are interested in doing the right thing by their family legacy and making sure headstones are a prominent part of their family grave sites. As with almost all other products of human endeavor, the appreciate of headstones is probably directly related to the amount of information most people have about just what goes into the making of the product. So, in an effort to perhaps instill more respect and appreciation for headstones across the land, we offer this overview of how headstones are made.
The Purpose of a Headstone
The first thing to consider about how headstones are made is the very reasons headstones are made. Once we have established those, we will quickly start to see the meaning behind the great work that goes into the making of a headstone. A headstone’s main purpose is historical. (It can also be intended to preserve a family’s legacy, of course, but a legacy is a function of history. So we stick to our main point: the main purpose behind a headstone is historical.) So, above all else, a headstone has to be sturdy. It has to weather the ages so that historians of the future can have an accurate record of the life (and death) of the deceased whose grave the stone marks.
Headstone’s accordingly, are typically made of stone. In decades past the availability of stone made cement the material of choice in headstone production, but those days are quickly leaving us (though they are not entirely gone for good) as historians have found that cement headstones fade too quickly. Many a cement grave marker across the United States is now illegible because time has worn away at the cement upon which its important identifying words had once been engraved. This is not necessarily a huge problem in cemeteries that have been well maintained over the years. Proper cleaning and maintenance, of course, can keep the engraved text on a cement headstone from becoming faded to the point that the grave can no longer be identified – and in many cases, entire sections of well-maintained cemeteries have had their cement headstones replaced with granite markers so as to protect the all-important text. But this sort of attention is too often lacking in tiny family-owned cemeteries that are established in very rural areas that see few visitors each year.
By keeping in mind the purpose of a headstone – a historical record of the generations that have roamed the Earth – headstone manufacturers have in recent decades made major strides in the making of headstones simply by keeping engraving to a minimum on cement blocks intended to be used to mark graves.
The Design of a Headstone
Once anyone who is interested in the making of a headstone can be reasonably assured that the text that will be inscribed upon the piece will remain legible for centuries on end – if it is inscribed in stone or metal rather than in cement – attention in the manufacturing process can be turned to the design of a grave marker.
A headstone’s design is perhaps the most important element of the making of the headstone because it is the central component. Families are almost always ultimately responsible for the content of the design of a headstone, but a high quality company that manufacturers headstones will typically offer a great deal of informed advice for the design. These “coaches” will usually work closely with a family to assure that several key elements of a headstone design are held in place by a family’s design order while also helping the family members create a piece that passionately and accurately reflects the memory of the deceased. Some of the typical elements that a headstone design will almost always include are the date of death, the date of birth, the deceased’s full legal name along with nicknames that he or she may have been known by, insignia of any significant groups with which the deceased was affiliated, and, of course, a carefully worded epitaph. To understand how pricing works for these details, read How Much Does It Cost To Engrave A Headstone? Increasingly, thanks t advances in engraving technology, headstone makers are incorporating color photographs into the design of a marker. But it should be noted that this practice is as risky as the previously mentioned innovation in which headstones were made from cement. Though the ink manufacturers are carefully considering the fading factor as they develop their products for use on headstones, there is no real way to know for sure whether the pictures will fade into oblivion over the course of just a few decades. So a good design coach who works for a headstone manufacturing company may encourage his or her clients to incorporate color photographs into the design of the grave marker being made, but the consultant should also be wary about using the color elements on the text portion of the headstone too. So long as the text remains true and legible through the ages, the color photo can fade away without any significant decline in the overall historical value of the grave marker in the future.
The Materials of a Headstone
As we have discussed above, the materials used to make a headstone are of utmost importance for the development of a headstone or grave marker that will be of value historically. Cement, though an inexpensive and generally hardy material, has proven over the past 100 years or so to be unreliable for such a purpose. This is mostly because cement does not hold engraving well. Unless a cement marker’s engraved etchings are cleaned fairly regularly (at least ever 2-3 years, many experts say), the elements will gradually eat away at the etchings, causing them to fade into oblivion over the course of 30-40 years in many cases.
So most headstones in today’s world are designed and built from granite or some other very sturdy non-porous stone. These naturally occurring materials can be engraved upon quite readily, and, as historians have noticed from the time of antiquity – when cement was not yet common – the etching will last for many centuries. As with all things, of course, granite headstones cannot be counted upon to last forever, but they will hold their engravings for hundreds of years longer than cement does and, from a historical perspective, that is a great thing.
Metal headstones (usually bronze) have proven to be the most reliable in terms of assuring that an engraving remains legible for the ages. In many cases today’s headstone manufacturers have begun attaching bronze metal engraved plates to a granite base – actually, in some cases – usually when money is an issue, the plates can be attached to cement bases too – for what amounts to the, perhaps, the best headstone combination the world has yet to produce. Because bronze plates use a “raised letter” method of engraving, the words and designs are more apt to remain legible for even longer than words etched into stone. And, when these plates are attached – usually with metal bolts – to granite, arguably the strongest material the earth has ever produced, a headstone maker is all-but-assuring that the deceased’s memory will live on for perhaps an eternity. Nothing, baring some sort of intentional vandalism or, perhaps an act of war, can destroy a sculpted headstone produced from this combination of materials.
The Installation of a Headstone
And, finally, we turn to the last stage of making a headstone, installation. For all practical purposes we will say that this activity is best left to those who have sufficient experience and equipment. While most headstone manufacturing companies these days do not worry themselves with the installation of their work, most commercially run cemeteries have trained personnel who can manage the installation in a quick and efficient manner. In most cases even paying $400 for this service is a bargain when one considers the amount of heavy lifting and tedious leveling that must be done to assure that the job is done right. Even in cases in which a cemetery does not have a professional staff available for this installation service, the person who runs the property will likely be acquainted with a person in the area who has the skills and tools necessary to do a good job on the cemetery.
We started this article by discussing the ways that cement used in the early 20th century for grave markers has hindered headstone manufacturing because of its tendency to fade and we end by reminding you that faulty installation of a headstone will lead to leaning, sinking and other problematic formations that will, likewise, keep the headstone from delivering completely on its promise to bring the current and past, gloriously, into the future.