City unveils new app to locate final resting places of Huntsville’s veterans

Published on November 8, 2024

Considering Huntsville's strong military ties, it's no surprise that Maple Hill Cemetery holds graves of veterans dating back to the Revolutionary War. Now, an app created by the City's Geographic Information Systems (GIS) Department allows users to locate each veteran's grave.

Each year, several groups and organizations place flags and wreaths on the graves of veterans on holidays like Memorial Day, Armed Forces Week, Christmas and Veterans Day.

City Director of Cemeteries Tara Sloan said these organizations previously had no way of knowing how many flags or wreaths to purchase or how to find veterans' graves.

"We appreciate the hard work of the City's GIS Department on this application to ensure veterans are honored," Sloan said. "Out of the estimated 80,000 to 100,000 individuals buried in Maple Hill Cemetery, they identified 2,220 veterans."

This was no small feat. In summer 2024, Will Ford, a University of Alabama in Huntsville intern working in the City's GIS Department, was tasked with this undertaking.

"To gather the data needed to create this application, Ford walked every acre of Maple Hill Cemetery with a GPS device, logging names, birth and death dates, military branches and the wars in which they fought," City GIS Manager Amy Kenum said. "We really enjoyed capturing this information for the history of Huntsville and to honor the City's veterans."

The work doesn't stop there as Maple Hill is simply the pilot program for tracking this data. Sloan hopes to repeat this effort at other City cemeteries.

Families of veterans whose graves are not found on the app are encouraged to email [email protected] and provide that information.

To use the app, visit maps.HuntsvilleAL.gov/cemetery, and use the map filters in the top right corner to show Maple Hill Veterans. You can also filter results by military conflict.