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New name, new look,
making history for local cemetery
The cemetery on Rt. 148
next to the
Williamson
County
Regional
Airport
had been known as
East
Lawn
Memorial
Gardens
through a couple generations.
The origin of the name is
unknown to Bryan Crain, president of Crain Cemetery
Services, which has owned the cemetery since 1995.
However, in some of the older records dating to the
1940’s & 1950’s the name
Egyptian
Memorial
Gardens
appears. “For
some reason, that name was phased out around 50 years ago”
said Crain.
The Crain family began
focusing on providing community mausoleums shortly after
acquiring the cemetery, and it wasn’t until the
groundbreaking ceremony in 2008 for the 3rd phase
of the mausoleum village that the future identity of the
cemetery became clear. When
Crain was telling his middle son Blake about the purpose and
significance of mausoleums and their history relating to the
pyramids of
Egypt
, Blake, who was 10 at the time, brought it all into
perspective.
Since the 4th
phase of the project was to be a funeral home chapel to
connect the three mausoleums, Blake suggested a pyramid roof
for the funeral home to symbolize the pyramids of
Egypt
, along with resurrecting the old name for the cemetery to
tie in with southern
Illinois
’ heritage as
Egypt
.
Further, as the
conversation progressed, it was obvious a new logo for the
cemetery was in order. With
the airport as the cemetery’s neighbor, Blake suggested an
airplane flying in next to the pyramid, just like in an
Indiana Jones’ movie, a favorite of his older sister
Ashley.
“We are a family
operation, and through family involvement we are
personalizing the heritage of the cemetery.
A cemetery is forever, and once a family entrusts
their loved one to our care, that relationship with the
family is forever. We
hope to enhance the personality of our beautiful cemetery
with the addition of the Great Pyramid of Southern Illinois
(
Egypt
).”
Completion for the
Pyramid, which will be an all-granite building, housing the
mausoleum chapel and the new Crain Funeral Home, will be in
the fall of this year. Open
house plans will be announced.
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