Cremation involves placing a dead human body in a casket or other combustible container, such as a cardboard box, and then placing the container in a cremation chamber or retort, where it is subjected to intense heat and flame. With natural gas burners, both the container and its human contents are incinerated, and substances are consumed or driven off—except for bone fragments and metal, such as dental gold and silver, medical devices, and implants. The remaining non-burnable skeletal fragments are then pulverized in a device that looks like a huge Waring blender. The processed cremains, or ashes, are then placed in a temporary plastic container or urn of one’s choice for final disposition—burial, scattering, or placement on the family mantel or in a columbarium niche, a structure designated specifically for the deposit of urns containing cremains. A columbarium is a smaller-scale mausoleum.

Rental caskets are often used in cremation cases. A cardboard tray insert, hidden by overlay material, is positioned in the bed area. After the funeral service, the deceased is slid out of the casket at one end through a drop-down door, a lid is secured on the cardboard insert, and the deceased goes to the crematory. A new interior and cardboard insert are then slid back into the casket for the next occupant.

I have encountered several situations in which people abhored the idea of a rental casket. One man wanted a complete funeral followed by cremation for his late wife. He absolutely loathed the idea that she would be cremated in a simple cardboard box. He wanted to purchase a very expensive solid cherry casket, hold the funeral service, and then cremate her in the purchased casket. That’s what we did.

Another time a man requested the same thing. He insisted on being with the body of his partner throughout the entire death-care process. When his partner died, he had followed the hearse from the hospital to the funeral home and had waited just outside the preparation room while embalming took place. Afterward, the decedent was placed on a dressing table, attired in a favorite set of silk pajamas and robe, and rolled into the chapel for an initial inspection.

The next day, the man returned, styled his partner’s hair, and purchased a stately solid walnut casket. After the service, he followed the hearse to the crematory and even helped roll the casket into the crematory receiving area. The operator, realizing he had a grieving person observing his every move, made an exception to his usual routine. Normally he would remove the casket lids, knock down the sides and ends with a sledgehammer, and pile the casket material in a corner to be burned on another day. Taking the casket apart down to only the bed on which the deceased is lying allows for a faster cremation and less fuel usage. But this time, the entire casket and its deceased cargo were inserted into the retort under the watchful eyes of a grieving friend.

Cremation is a growing trend that is slowly making its way into my part of the country, where mostly people prefer to be buried in the ground. Casket manufacturers are feverishly attempting to assist funeral directors by developing new profit producers associated with cremation products and services. From fancier low-end cremation caskets to more expensive cremation urns, directors in the Midwest are going through a feeling-out period—trying to determine what consumers deem valuable and, more important, what they’re willing to pay extra for.

After attending a few casket-company-sponsored seminars to introduce the newest offerings for cremation, I have to admit to being amazed at the possibilities. There are cremation-friendly caskets with themed head panels, just like those offered on expensive steel caskets; myriad urns, from the most basic to the most elaborate; mini-urns that match normal urns, so that children can be presented with a small amount of their grandmother’s ashes; stainless-steel bracelets equipped with small openings to deposit a smidgeon of ashes and cover later with a screw-on birthstone cap; and even necklaces with mini-urns attached to the chain! I have actually sold many of these products, so perhaps the casket manufacturers are on to something. If they offer it, someone will probably buy it.

I once believed that only wealthy and highly educated people desired to be cremated. The funeral home where I worked as a teenager was the firm of choice for the area’s upper crust, and I was often puzzled as to why doctors and lawyers were not given full-service funerals with all the trimmings. I was told that their families, for generations, had selected cremation, because it was simpler and less stressful for the survivors. I didn’t buy it. I believed that it was really because the people didn’t have time for a grieving period and didn’t want to spend any unnecessary money. Perhaps the rich and the learned of my area had brought their death-care philosophies with them when they arrived from other countries generations earlier.

The cremation rate nears 60 percent in the big metropolises of the East and West coasts, but it is low indeed in Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, and their surrounding environs. I have even noticed that if an economically challenged family in the South is offered cremation when funds are lacking, they respond with disdain or even anger. Working-class people used to consider the idea of cremation an affront. Today it’s more acceptable, but still not nearly as popular as ground burial. One contributing factor to this might be its growing acceptance by Roman Catholics, who previously deemed cremation as taboo.

Also adding to the increase is the higher cost of funerals and especially cemetery charges. Grave-space prices, charges for opening and closing graves, and burial vault requirements have increased disproportionately compared to other rate-of-inflation spikes. When a single grave space costs a family $1,500, opening and closing it costs $900, and a required vault costs $800, then the family has to come up with $3,200 before even speaking with a funeral director. Opting for cremation eliminates that charge.

CREMATION OPTIONS

There are three categories of cremation-related services. First is immediate cremation or direct cremation—the body is cremated shortly after death, with no accompanying ceremonies or rites. The body is removed; placed in a minimum (cardboard) container; and after an arrangement conference with the decedent’s family and acquisition of proper signatures, the decedent is cremated. The ashes are delivered in either a basic plastic temporary container or in an urn of the family’s selection. Loved ones then decide on the final disposition of the ashes—burial, scattering, or even retaining them for the next family death or perhaps a dual scattering.

I have scattered ashes on behalf of family members many times, sometimes with unanticipated snafus. An avid fisherman passed away recently, and his children wanted his ashes scattered in the nearby river, where he had spent many a pleasant evening. When I handed over the urn, the family asked if I would be willing to accompany them and actually pour the contents into the water. I agreed. But on the riverbank in December, perhaps I should have held the open container just above the water instead of at waist level. The howling wind blew a large quantity of the ashes right back into our chilled faces.

The deceased man’s children received that ominous affront with good-natured laughter. Their dad, they said, would have gotten quite a kick out of the calamity. The incident reminded me of the day that Ted Kennedy and his family attempted to scatter the ashes of John F. Kennedy Jr. and his wife, Carolyn, off the end of a naval vessel in the open sea. With high winds and cameras rolling, it appeared that the ashes blew right back toward the ship.

An active elderly lady of substantial means contracted with me for the direct cremation of her late husband of forty-eight years. The day I presented her with her beloved spouse’s ashes, she asked whether I would call the office of their favorite golf course to request a scattering into one of the sand traps. This sweet couple had played there in a mixed golf league every Thursday for several years. She even specified the sand trap on the sixth hole, since her husband had been stuck there on several occasions.

I had heard such a request before and in each case had been denied—so I offered her a sneaky alternative. Why not go out to the course as usual on Thursday with her husband’s ashes quietly stashed in her golf bag? Upon reaching the designated trap, she could open the container, pour the ashes into the sand, and use the provided rake to mix them. She called me on Friday morning to report that the deed was done, even though she felt like a criminal the whole time.

With direct cremation, the customer can save hundreds of dollars merely by price shopping on the phone or in person. In my area, direct cremation charges range from a low (at my own funeral home) of $895, including the crematory fee, to a high of $2,495, not including the crematory fee. Crematory operators charge from $180 to $350 to actually cremate the body, and I include that fee as part of my service charge, although most funeral homes do not. Among other states, Florida and California are popular cremation states and are known for conducting price wars for services. Billboard and telephone book advertisements tout the best prices that funeral homes and even direct-disposal operators offer. It is not uncommon to see a billboard in California offering immediate cremation for $395.

Cremation with a memorial is the second category. This is basically the same service as in direct cremation, but an actual funeral ceremony is conducted without the body present. There are extra charges for use of the funeral home or church chapel, an obituary, a register book, clergy, and perhaps flowers. Funeral directors are much happier when a family decides to have a memorial service as opposed to mere direct cremation, as they can make a little more money and an obituary usually appears in the newspaper, which is great advertising. Charges for cremation with a memorial service, like any funeral home service offerings, vary tremendously, so customers should shop around.

The third category is a complete funeral service followed by cremation, which is a growing phenomenon in the funeral industry. The body is embalmed, dressed, placed in a rental casket (or even a purchased wood casket), and a visitation and funeral service are conducted traditionally—the same scenario that precedes a ground burial. The obvious difference is in the final disposition of the deceased. Instead of loading the casket into a hearse for a procession to the cemetery, the family and friends leave the funeral home and the body is cremated in private. This trend is a result of ever-increasing prices that cemeteries charge for grave spaces and for opening and closing the grave. Families have told me that they are happy to have a complete traditional funeral ceremony, cremate the deceased loved one, and not pay between $2,000 and $3,000 to a cemetery for ground burial.

CEMETERIES

Cemeteries are also feeling the effects of the cremation trend and fewer ground burials. To offset the decrease in cash flow, for years operators have sold burial vaults, monuments and markers, and now even caskets. In the early 1970s, funeral directors and cemetery operators began what is now an ongoing adversarial relationship. Directors took offense at cemetery operators’ sales of and profits from items that were once their exclusive domain.

When cemeteries first began to sell burial vaults, funeral homes dismissed it as a passing fad. Soon consumers would realize the error of their ways and stop buying products from vendors who had no business selling them. One early problem with cemetery vault sales was that cemetery personnel did not know the difference between a concrete box and an actual sealing vault. And since consumers had even less knowledge, many times a cheaply made fragile box was placed in a grave with the assumption that it was a sealed vault. Funeral directors banded together to try to stop cemetery operators from selling traditional funeral merchandise without a director’s license. That attempt went nowhere, and cemetery operators still actively promote burial vaults.

The fact that the cemetery usually stores the complete burial vault outdoors until needed is a thorn in my side. Concrete burial vaults stored in heat, cold, rain, and snow lose significant strength over time and become very fragile indeed. I have seen several cracked, cemetery-provided burial vaults being installed in graves, even though structural integrity was clearly lacking.

Forest Lawn Memorial Parks, in Los Angeles, probably initiated the idea of combining burial and a funeral home in the same location. Memorial parks are cemeteries with either very few or no upright monuments. Forest Lawn takes pride in the fact that there are no upright monuments to clutter the park-like setting, and the beautiful rolling hills attest to that. Flat bronze, ground-level grave markers are barely visible from a distance. You have to walk right up to a grave site to find out who is buried there. For them, it makes sense to have “everything in one place,” to quote a 1940s Forest Lawn newspaper ad. “Everything” means cemetery property, crematory, mortuary, and flowers and grave markers available for purchase.

Forest Lawn’s founder met tremendous resistance from area funeral homes when he first introduced the concept. However, Forest Lawn prevailed and is the largest such operation in the United States today, and it’s still owned and operated by the same family. The combination idea is another one whose time has not yet arrived in my neck of the woods, where the funeral industry evolves at a snail’s pace.

THE WAY IT USED TO BE

Over the years, I’ve enjoyed reviewing the old funeral records at my former places of employment. Dusty binders from the 1950s and 1960s were a favorite research item for me, especially to review funeral costs back in the day. Besides the obvious itemized entries of the time, such as the funeral home service charge and merchandise charges, I noticed that the preprinted records of the funeral often listed a fee for a door badge and wreath. I asked my elderly employer at that time what those things were. He informed me that, many years ago, following the Victorian tradition, people would affix an intricate black badge or a black wreath on the front door of a home that had experienced a death in the family. Sometimes they attached black bunting to the outside entranceway of the residence to further inform the community that death had visited the home and that proper respect and sympathy was in order. Even today, we Americans still somewhat cling to the Victorian ritual of wearing black as a symbol of mourning. In England in Queen Victoria’s time, a mourning widow was expected to wear black clothing for the entire year following her husband’s demise. The mourning period for other members of the family depended on their relationship to the deceased and included wearing a black armband. We follow that tradition to a degree today, as when a police officer or firefighter dies in the line of duty and his or her colleagues wear black armbands or a swatch of black tape over their badges. Also, in the sporting world, mourning is displayed conspicuously on uniforms with the deceased player’s uniform number or initials.

Another Victorian practice is still found today. In the 1800s, it was common to keep some of the hair of a deceased person, and the practice expanded into an art form. Jewelers of the day would take woven hair of the deceased and design and produce bracelets, earrings, and even watch chains in which the hair was the focal point of the design. Watch chains made of intricately woven hair survive today. I currently grant two or three requests a year for the hair of a deceased person. Sometimes people ask for just a small wisp, and other times they ask me to clip enough to fill a paper sack.

Wearing jewelry constructed from the hair of the deceased is probably the reason for the recent popularity of cremation jewelry that the major casket manufacturers and others are producing. Cremated remains are now “processed,” or ground up, much more finely than in the past, to a consistency of white sand, to accommodate the customer’s desire to retain some of their loved one’s remains. Gold and silver chains that feature a tiny urn or receptacle for cremated remains are very popular today, as are hollow bracelets that can be unscrewed at the ends for a portion of ashes to be deposited inside.