Sebastian Cemetery — Sebastian, Florida

Sebastian Cemetery, formally the Sebastian Municipal Cemetery, is the public cemetery owned and run by the City of Sebastian. The city cemetery page gives its address as 1921 N. Central Avenue, Sebastian, FL 32958, and lists it among city departments alongside contacts in the City Clerk's office and Parks and Recreation. Vero News, reporting on the cemetery in 2013, described it as the Sebastian Cemetery on US 1.

The cemetery is older than the city. Sebastian was not incorporated as a city until 1923, according to the RICHES archive at the University of Central Florida, but the burial ground began decades earlier on the homestead of pioneer August Park. In 2022 the Florida Division of Historical Resources placed a state historical marker titled Park Family Cemetery at the 1921 N. Central Avenue location, recording how a family burial plot became the town cemetery, and noting veterans of five wars and Pelican Island warden Paul Kroegel among those buried there.

The state marker tells the founding story. August Park was born in Danzig, Germany, in 1833, immigrated to the United States, traveled to New York and later moved to Fort Pierce. He settled in the Sebastian area in 1865, which the marker describes as making him the first permanent resident of European descent, and he purchased 43 acres in the Sebastian area, where he lived for 30 years.

Park's land served the wider settlement. According to the marker, he opened his family's home to other settlers arriving in Sebastian and let them stay until they found a permanent place to live. He also allowed other settlers to use his land for burial, beginning with a father whose son had died, so the plot took in neighbors as well as family while Sebastian was still the fishing village that the RICHES archive dates to the 1870s.

The transfer to public ownership came after Park's death. The marker states that after Park died in 1895, his family donated the burial land to the town of Sebastian, creating the Sebastian Municipal Cemetery, and that burials there have since far outgrown Park's family and neighbors. The City of Sebastian has operated the Sebastian Municipal Cemetery as a public cemetery since that gift.

The marker highlights two groups. First, it records that the Sebastian Municipal Cemetery holds veterans from the Civil War, the Spanish American War, World War I, World War II and the Korean War. The City of Sebastian's cemetery page links information on free military honors for the families of deceased veterans, and the city's cemetery rules allow markers from the Veterans Administration to carry the veteran's name, rank, serial number and date of death.

Second, the marker names Paul Kroegel as a notable burial, describing him as the manager of the first national wildlife refuge who was instrumental in establishing Pelican Island, the first federal bird reservation. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service states that after President Theodore Roosevelt established Pelican Island in the Indian River Lagoon on March 14, 1903, Audubon hired Paul Kroegel as the first warden of Pelican Island.

Public officials are buried there too. Sebastian Daily reported in August 2020 that Earl Roberts, who moved to Sebastian in 1942 and was elected Mayor of the City of Sebastian in 1947, was buried in the Sebastian Cemetery without a proper grave marker, and that a plan was in place to provide one.

The city handles sales, records and maintenance itself. Its cemetery rules and regulations, Chapter 34 of the Sebastian city code, state that the cemetery sexton and the office of the city clerk keep the records, that every interment site must be located by the sexton or another designated city official, and that fees for sites and services are set by resolution of the Sebastian City Council. In 2013, Vero News reported that the city manager and the city clerk both managed the Sebastian Cemetery.

Chapter 34 also sets up how the cemetery pays for itself. It establishes a cemetery trust fund, administered by the Sebastian finance director, with a permanent endowment of at least $375,000 whose proceeds may be used only for the operation, care and maintenance of the cemetery. Proceeds from selling interment sites go into the trust fund, half added to the endowment and the rest reserved for capital expansion such as plotting new sites, land acquisition and watering systems.

Day-to-day rules are specific. Under Chapter 34 the Sebastian Municipal Cemetery is open daily from 7:00 a.m. until sunset, vehicles may not exceed 15 miles per hour on internal roads, and interments are permitted seven days a week except Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day, with 48 hours of prior notice to the sexton. The city's cemetery page also links a cemetery map, an interactive map for finding a loved one, a See My Legacy service and the full service rate sheet.

Site sizes and burial methods are fixed by the Sebastian code. A standard in-ground site measures 4 by 8 feet and a cremains site 4 by 4 feet, with niches in units 3 and 4 of the cemetery. Every standard in-ground burial requires a concrete vault or other approved permanent grave liner, graves must be dug at least five feet deep at the shallowest point, and above-ground vaults are prohibited in Sebastian Cemetery.

Markers follow a mostly flush design. Chapter 34 requires markers to be bronze, marble or granite and flush with the ground, installed within 120 days after burial, but it makes an exception to preserve the historic nature of Units 1 and 4 of the Sebastian Cemetery, where restoration of existing slabs and above-ground markers is allowed. Above-ground markers on standard sites are permitted in Units 1, 3 and 4, up to 48 inches high.

Decorations are limited. The Sebastian rules allow no more than two bouquets of artificial or fresh flowers at a gravesite, bar glass or ceramic containers, permit flower blankets around holidays for up to ten days, and prohibit fences, copings, hedges and earth mounds around graves. Living memorial trees or shrubs may be planted only by arrangement with the sexton in a designated area.

Space has been the long-running issue. In May 2013, Vero News reported that the Sebastian Cemetery could be expanded by 1.4 acres if the city approved a $300,000 purchase of the property immediately north of it, a price the city manager said he had negotiated down from an asking price of $375,000. City officials estimated that the existing cemetery had 10 to 15 years of burial space left and that the parcel, the only available land for expansion, could extend its life another 50 years. The Sebastian City Council unanimously approved a $10,000 refundable deposit while the site was researched.

Later reporting describes expansion work on the grounds. In January 2021, Sebastian Daily reported that the long-serving supervisor of the Sebastian Municipal Cemetery, who had worked in the city's cemetery division since October 1983, had been a key planner in the expansion and development of the cemetery property to include new roadways and irrigation, as well as survey mapping and marking of gravesites.