Page A25 December 2022 FUNERAL HOME & CEMETERY NEWS Se c t i on A SCI and Missing In America Project Inter 99 Unclaimed Veterans with Full Honors HOUSTON,TX— Service Corporation International (SCI) and its brand, Dignity Memorial®, have partnered with the Missing In America Project (MIAP) to inter the ashes of 99 veterans who never received a proper burial. The veterans have gone unclaimed for decades, either because their families never made arrangements, or they did not have living family members to arrange a service. The largest burial in MIAP history, the veterans will receive a dignified ceremony and final recognition of deep gratitude for their faithful service to our country. The ceremony with full military honors was open to the public and hosted by Evergreen Washelli Funeral Home &Cemetery in Seattle, WA on Monday, November 14. On November 16, the veterans’ ashes were transported to Washington State Veterans Cemetery, where they were laid to rest. The veterans to be interred served in the US Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Army Air Forces, Coast Guard and Merchant Marines during the Spanish American War, World Wars I and II, Korea, Vietnam, and non-war specific periods. The 99 veterans include: • Brothers Glen Whitfield Sutherland and Ray C. Sutherland. Glen was in the Army and Ray was in the Navy Reserves. • Several veterans who arrived in the United States from other countries, including Switzerland, Norway, Greece, Bulgaria, and China. • Brothers Albert Wilkins and William Wilkins. Albert served in the Army, and William was a Marine. • Father and son, Carl Croson, who served in the Army in World War I, and Kenneth Croson, who served in the United States Coast Guard in World War II. “We are honored to give these veterans the dignified burial they deserve for bravely serving our country during times of war and peace,” said Jay Waring, SCI’s Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer. “It’s tragic that they were deprived of a military funeral. We are going to honor their courage and selflessness.” “Every veteran signed a blank check to the United States of America up to and including their life. One thing they were promised was an honorable, dignified military burial. We are going to fulfill that obligation because it’s the right thing to do,” said Clyde Taylor, Vice President of MIAP. In addition to the veterans, MIAP identified 14 spouses of veterans and 10 dependent children who have been unclaimed and who were eligible for burial in the state veterans cemetery. They were also laid to rest on November 16. Missing In America Veterans recovery program visits funeral homes around the country to fulfill their mission of securing a final resting place for the forgotten heroes. Volunteers create an inventory of ashes, and verify the date of birth, date of death and any other available information. Often, considering how long the ashes have gone unclaimed, the funeral home does not have the complete information needed to verify veteran status, so MIAP volunteers submit a request to the National Cemetery Scheduling and Eligibility Office (NCSEO) for verification. Once determined eligible, MIAP then coordinates with a State or National Veterans Cemetery to provide final interment with military honors. The process requires extensive research, and sometimes takes up to a year to prove eligibility. While it is unknown why the veterans were unclaimed, every year, thousands of ashes go unclaimed by surviving family members, friends, and loved ones. Periodically, Dignity Memorial locations invite MIAP volunteers to research unclaimed remains still in their care, to determine if any of them are veterans. When they can validate a decedent’s veteran status and eligibility to be interred at a national cemetery, Dignity Memorial partners with the MIAP to inter the veterans with full military honors. For more information, visit www.scicorp.com or www.dignitymemorial.com. SCI Announces Third Quarter Results HOUSTON,TX— Service Corporation International (NYSE: SCI) reported results for the third quarter of 2022. Tom Ryan, the Company’s Chairman and CEO, commented on the third quarter performance: “The number of funeral services performed is trending higher than we anticipated and is approximately 5% higher than 2019 levels on a compounded annual growth basis. “Cemetery preneed sales production continues to be strong, growing this quarter 5% versus a COVID impacted prior year quarter and has experienced nearly 19% compounded annual growth over 2019 levels. “I would like to thank our 24,000 associates for their unwavering commitment in providing excellent service to our client families. We believe our long-term growth strategy is on track as we continue to grow revenue, leverage our unparalleled scale, and deploy our capital wisely to enhance shareholder value.” Service Corporation International also announced that its Board of Directors has approved an increase in its quarterly cash dividend to twenty-seven cents per share of common stock. This quarterly cash dividend declared today represents an 8% increase (L to R) Dr. Hari P. Close, II, Chairman of the Board for the National Funeral Directors & Morticians Association, Gary and Denise Rollins Gary has been in the funeral industry for 40 years. “I came out of the military and was thinking of professions where I lived at,” says Gary. “African Americans did not have a funeral home,” he says of his hometown. So, he went to Baltimore and did his apprenticeship with Vernon Bailey and Herbert E. Nutter at Nutter Funeral Home. He learned a lot from these prominent funeral directors. “He perfected my embalming skills,” Gary says of Bailey. He moved back home once he completed his studies and apprenticeship, and in 1993, he was able to open a funeral home in a small building. By 1996, he purchased a building right around the corner, where he stayed until this year when they moved into the new building. “We were looking for a different concept of what a funeral home would look like,” says Gary. The whole perception of what you’d expect - both in the building itself and what they do - is altered. “It’s a metal building, very industrial looking. It has different facets, angles, turns. It’s super modern,” Gary says. The building simply doesn’t look like a funeral home. The outside isn’t typical, but Rollins Celebration Center Continued from Front Page has a copper and black color scheme. “One end of the building has rounded corners, like a turret on a castle,” he added. “There’s a big, huge window that emulates a cross and inside is a baby grand piano,” describes Gary. The front entranceway is made of stone and has a “dominating effect on you. It looks like a mega church.” Some features of the new building include a 20-foot wide by 70 foot long patio on which are benches. People in the community are welcome to immortalize loved ones through plaques which are placed on the benches. There are also plaques along the walls of the vestibule that can be in memory of or in honor of a loved one. The individual doesn’t need to be deceased to be recognized. When you walk through the doors into the lobby, you face the waterwall and are surrounded by ceramic Art Deco-style tile. “It’s contemporary-looking with different flairs, including the furniture,” Gary says. “I like architecture,” he explains. Denise’s great grandfather was the first African American undertaker in Frederick County, and the couple has created a room that celebrates the era when he was an embalmer - from the pictures on the wall to Continued on page A26 Alhiser-Comer Mortuary Celebrates 125 Years in Business Continued from Page A20 Alhiser-Comer Lobby Nicole and Megan with their father, Stuart Comer she wasn’t as certain about it at first. She worked in retail sales and had a business degree, but when her father got sick, he asked her to come back and help him. She did, and the current manager put in a two-week’s notice, from the previously declared quarterly dividend of twenty-five cents per share of common stock per quarter. Service Corporation International (NYSE: SCI), headquartered in Houston, is North America’s leading provider of funeral, cemetery and cremation services, as well as final-arrangement planning in advance, serving more than 600,000 families each year. At September 30, 2022, they owned and operated 1,463 funeral service locations and 488 cemeteries (of which 300 are combination locations) in 44 states, eight Canadian provinces, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. For more information about Service Corporation International, please visit www.sci-corp.com. leaving the role open for her. Her father told her, “Well, you’d better go and get your license,” and that’s just what she did. “Working at Alhiser-Comer turned out to be something that all of my experiences - counselor, teacher, sales, business – all Continued on page A28 both Bill and his son Stuart, Megan’s father, who was at this point ready to own his own funeral home. The Wilsons wanted a family that was part of the community to take over and the Comers were the perfect choice. In 1989, Bill and Stuart purchased the funeral home, leaving the one they owned in Poway to Megan’s aunt and uncle. In the early 2000s, they changed the name to its current name. Megan says her sister, Nicole Comer-Postma, a funeral director at AlhiserComer, was always involved in the funeral home, but
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