For Jimmy Lamb and Alexander Chase going to work means taking care of family and friends.
Between them, the two men have 30 years of service at one of the state?s veterans cemeteries in Crownsville. They are part of a small grounds crew that digs graves, lays tombstones, cuts the grass and generally keeps the 103-acre field as crisp as a military dress uniform.
“My grandparents and some friends are buried out here,” Lamb said. “You get to know people; there are people coming and going all the time.”
On the Friday before Memorial Day, the grounds crew was measuring for four new graves in a recently opened section of the cemetery off Route 178. Maryland is one of 30 states that operates veterans cemeteries.
“It?s a challenge to do the things we do and maintain a good attitude,” said Chase, who also has family members buried at the cemetery.
“We see alot of people, and you have to baby them sometimes. But there are friends and family here that I look out for.”
Members of the grounds crew and other employees of the Maryland Department of Veterans Affairs even have served as pallbearers and mourners for veterans who have no surviving relatives or have been abandoned by their families.
To be buried in one of the state?s five veterans cemeteries, a veteran must have lived in Maryland for at least two years, or must prove that he or she was a resident at the time of entry into military service or at the time of death.
Garrison Forest Veterans Cemetery in Baltimore County is the state?s busiest, averaging 1,225 to 1,250 burials per year, said Robert Hooper, director of the state?s veterans cemetery and memorial programs. Other cemeteries are in Cheltenham in Dorchester County on the Eastern Shore and Rocky Gap in Allegany County in Western Maryland.
Hooper said Garrison Forest has begun marking off an additional 25 acres of unused space on its property for burials, and Crownsville has begun prepping an additional 11 acres of unused land.
He said state cemeteries appeal to many veterans, because the state picks up the tab for burial costs.
“But besides the money, they know they?re getting full honors and they?re getting the respect they deserve for serving their country,” Hooper said.
