Established in 1886 outside the city limits when St. Augustine closed its small urban graveyards due to overcrowding. Evergreen became the region's largest Protestant cemetery of the late 1800's and early 1900s. The design was strongly influenced by America's Rural Cemetery Movement stressing that burying and commemorating the dead was best done in a tranquil, natural landscape set apart from urban life. These principals are reflected in Evergreen's garden setting and its winding roads and pathways. Many styles of funerary embellishments popular during the period are evidenced in large monuments, elegant statuary, ornamental plantings and formal landscaping. Grave marker iconography includes reclining lambs, praying angels, broken columns, Celtic crosses, flower motifs, Woodmen of the World "trees" and monuments featuring classical revival designs and shapes. Evergreen is the final resting place of Randolph Caldecott (1846-1886), considered the originator of children's picture books and after whom the national Caldecott Medal for distinguished children's picture book is named; and Heath Canfield (1849-1913), winner of the Congressional Medal of Honor for gallantry in action as a U.S. Cavalryman in 1870.
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