- May 1, 2024
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Association plans to map grave sites.
Wayne Grant
News Editor
The names on the tombstones are familiar to anyone who has lived in Ormond Beach. Sterthaus. Bostrum. Price. Vining.
This cemetery on the beachside, with its simple wooden fence, is easy to miss for travelers on Seton Trail, yet those at rest there are among the most important figures in area history.
Strolling the grounds reveals the graves of original settlers, such as the Bostrum family, and important figures such as Adelaide Ellicott, founder of the Garden Club of the Halifax Country. Modern day notables are interred there also, such as famed sand sculptor Marc Altamare and NASCAR founder “Big Bill” France.
Finding the graves is now a matter of serendipity, but this could change in the future thanks to the efforts of the board members of the Hillside Cemetery Association, who have family members or ancestors buried at the grounds.
At their 120th anniversary meeting on Sept. 16, the association members heard plans by the board to have a mapping survey done to list every grave on the historic grounds. Other plans call for a columbarium and improved parking and maintenance.
Suzanne Heddy, executive director of the Ormond Beach Historical Society, is looking forward to working with the association. She told the board she would like to have historical tours, similar to the ones they have at Pilgrims Rest Cemetery on West Granada Boulevard.
“This would be a great tour,” she said. “We’d love to have at it.”
Joyce Benedict, also of the historical society, said she was “itching to get in there with some re-enactors.”
The recently-formed Hillside Angels is a 501c3 organization that is going to support the board’s efforts.
“We’re going to be friend raising and fund raising,” said Andy Foster, president of the Angels group. “We want to raise money so this cemetery is sustainable for the foreseeable future and the unforeseeable future.”
Built on ancient sand dunes, the cemetery grounds seem to roll like the ocean that is only a few blocks away. The soil and the slopes make the maintenance of the graves more difficult.
George Farinick, association member, has repaired several of the tombstones. For one stone, he had to dig around the base to find all of the pieces, which he said were pretty deep.
“We’re just trying to do some good,” he said.
The association has also been aided by the Kiwanis Club of Ormond Beach, whose members painted the fence and repaired a storage building.
The land was owned by the Bostrums, who donated it as a cemetery. John and Andrew Bostrum had homesteaded in the area of Riverside Drive in the 1880s and owned land all the way to the ocean. It was Andrew Bostrum, who, along with John Anderson, suggested that the city be named after James Ormond and the banana tree adopted as its symbol, according to historical documents.
