Together, the thousands of white marble monuments lined up like soldiers as far as the eye can see testify to a nation’s sacrifice.
Individually, the simple headstones bear witness to a life well lived, a family member loved, a couple’s final resting place, a veteran’s decorated service.
At Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery, the plumb rows of upright slabs with arched tops have a symbolic uniformity that seems to fade away at the inscriptions.
A name, rank and branch of service, a religious emblem, a faraway battle site, birth and death dates — all tell a story engraved in stone.
Since 2023, those inscriptions have been done within steps of the cemetery’s legion of gravesites directly on the 338-acre, landscaped burial grounds.
In a small workshop just inside the main gates, Stone Engraver Andrew Adkins spends his days carefully placing custom stencils onto a row of stone slabs, then uses a dolly to move each 250-pound slab into an enclosed space where he dons protective gear and carves the inscription using a sandblaster.
With more than 4,000 burials a year at the cemetery, the work is a continuous cycle.
On a recent warm and muggy afternoon, Adkins had a row of recently delivered blank slabs, 42 inches tall, leaning side-by-side against a support ready for stenciling and several already stenciled.
Another row of headstones that had been pulled from existing burial sites in the cemetery were being cleaned and prepared for an additional inscription as when a spouse dies and the couple is buried together. Those are called “the R-2s.”
Adkins also engraves the cemetery’s smaller columbarium and flat plaques, which sit flush to the ground.
The work is pretty straightforward but must be completed within a tight timeframe, he said. “It’s a lot of really just attention to detail and time management.”
Adkins, who only started in the job in April, is a one-man operation.
While the nature and location of his work doesn’t bother him, an inscription will occasionally make him emotional. “Some are just, I don’t know, sadder than others,” he said.
But the Indiana native and five-year U.S. Navy veteran also feels good about his daily mission, knowing he is continuing to serve his country in another way.
The National Cemetery Administration contracted Tampa-based P&G Memorials for the work at Fort Sam just over two years ago, said Assistant Cemetery Director Graham Wright.
Previously, the slabs were delivered already engraved from a national vendor that supplied several cemeteries.
With more than 2,500 new stones needed at the Fort Sam cemetery every year, engraving on site has made the process more efficient by cutting transport time, Wright said.
“That took off at least a good 20 days worth of lead time in order to get our stones to us so we can set them within our timeframe, which is zero to 60 days after the internment of the person who’s laid to rest here,” Wright said.
The director and his staff do quality control on every stone, ensuring the inscription is accurate and the carving depth is appropriate. Cemetery staff install the headstones at gravesites.
The headstones are government-owned property and come from a manufacturer at a cost of $434.60 per stone, Wright said.
“The purpose of the headstone is not only to honor and memorialize the persons laid to rest there, but it also is there to mark the grave site,” he said. “So we have a duty to the American public, as well as to the veteran and the families, to maintain those and to have the highest quality standards we possibly can.”
On Sunday, hundreds of volunteers with Flags for Fallen Vets will walk among those nearly 200,000 graves at the national cemetery, pausing briefly to pay their respects and place a small flag at each headstone in remembrance.
For Adkins, the cemetery reminds him of the Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia where he was once stationed nearby — and of a nation’s sacrifice.
“It’s just kind of crazy to think that there are so many [headstones],” he said.
“And I know it’s from the beginning of our nation and all that, but still, it’s just so many — people that served our country, and some of them gave their lives [and] some of them were lucky enough to live out their whole lives before passing.”
