Fairview Cemetery

They don bright green shirts, work up a sweat and often go unnoticed – but for good reason.The maintenance crew for the Owasso Fairview Cemetery spend much of their time behind the scenes living up to their strong work ethic, evidenced by the property’s pristine landscape.“If we can make our citizens’ lives easier, that’s what we’re here for,” said Sonya Boggs, cemetery groundskeeper. “It’s not a point of us really being noticed; that’s our job.”And that job means putting in long hours to provide a peaceful and consoling environment for grieving families to honor their lost loved ones.Boggs and her teammate Joey Dietzfeld, cemetery groundskeeper, are two of nine city employees who take every Thursday to look after the 10-acre tract of land, which consists of 4,035 burial plots situated across 155 lots within 12 blocks.“Nine guys to get everything done in the cemetery that needs to be done in one day … it takes a whole team effort,” Dietzfeld said. “It is a very, very physically demanding job.”Their primary tasks include overseeing operations and conducting needed maintenance, along with coordinating the opening and closing of burial sites throughout the property.This includes mowing, edging, weeding and trimming trees, as well as refilling and resodding fresh graves and raising newer headstones that regularly sink due to inclement weather.“The minute (the dirt) gets wet, it will compact down, so we have to refill it some more,” Boggs said. “If that stone is set in there too soon before it’s had time to get good compaction, then it will (sink).”Accounting for an average of 33 burials every year (20 so far this year), Boggs and her team keep busy beautifying the landscape and reorienting the headstones, especially during the damper months such as winter and spring.Their efforts, however, go far beyond just routine maintenance.Every week, the group dedicates much of their time to preserving and safeguarding pictures, personal mementos and flower arrangements at the gravesites, w... (Tulsa World)