Cremation Service History

Posted on December 17, 2018 by Cameron Naugle under Cremation
Leave a comment

Cremations services in Orange Park, FL and beyond are not new at all.  In fact, historians believe that humans started burning their dead as early as 3000 B.C. Archeologists have discovered pottery shards and urns that service as evidence that cremation started spreading across northern Europe, Spain, Portugal and the British Isles during the Bronze Age, from 2500 to 1000 B.C. Cremation became more and more popular until Homer’s time, around 800 B.C, when it became the most common disposition method. This rise in cremation is assumed to be because of the growing number of dead from both war and disease.   

Read also: Tips For Paying For Cremation Services

By 395 A.D, when the Roman Empire was at its peak, cremation was widely practiced, and people stored the ashes in elaborate urns like we do today. However, the early Christians still practiced traditional Jewish body disposition, and therefore disapproved of cremation. When Constantine made Christianity the official Roman religion in 400 A.D, the practice almost disappeared in favor of the traditional Jewish burial.   

Modern Cremation  

Cremations services in Orange Park, FLCremation as we know it only began in 1873 when an Italian professor displayed his new cremation chamber model at the Vienna Exposition. His new invention jump-started the cremation revolution on both sides of the Atlantic.  

The first modern cremation chamber in the United States was built in Washington, Pennsylvania in 1876 by Dr. Julius LeMoyne, with the second not far behind in Lancaster, PA in 1884. Soon, crematories were being built all across the US, and by the year 1900 there were 20 in operation. The practice took off even more when, in 1913, Dr. Hugo Erichsen started the Cremation Association of America.   

The Cremation Association of America  

Dr. Erichsen began the foundation as way to spread to word about this modern way of safely and hygienically disposing of bodies. The foundation was originally made up of doctors with concerns about the spread of diseases from whole-body burials to living humans. This belief and the foundation continued to foster cremation popularity until the 1920s when it was proven that whole body burials, when done properly were just as safe for the public’s health. After that discovery, the Cremation Association of America switched gears and began promoting cremation not as a health choice but as a memorialization choice. The foundation changed its name to Cremation Association of North America (CANA), in 1975, and is still around today.   

Read also: Learn More About Cremation

Still Growing   

Cremation has been becoming more and more popular since the 1980s in America and around the world. This rise is due to a number of factors such as cost, environmental concerns, creativity, religion and more. While traditional burial is still the most commonly seen disposition method, studies show that might not always be the case. According to CANA, there were over 2,100 crematories in use in the US in 2009 performing over 9,000 cremations a year, and the number is still going up.   

Naugle Funeral Home & Cremation Services offers Orange Park, FL cremation services from 808 Margaret St Jacksonville, FL 32204. Give us a call at (904) 683-9288 for more information.  

Cameron Naugle

Paul (Cameron) Naugle, Jr., a fourth generation funeral director was born and raised in Jacksonville, Florida. He graduated from Wolfson High School and then went on to graduate from Gupton-Jones College of Funeral Services in Atlanta, Georgia where he was part of the National Mortuary Honor Society (Phi Sigma Eta). He then graduated from The University of North Florida with a degree in Business Administration. He is a licensed funeral director as well as a licensed embalmer. He took over the position of President and CEO of Naugle Funeral Home and Cremation Services in 2012, following in his father’s, grandfather’s and great-grandfather’s footsteps. Cameron is married to Katherine Schnauss Naugle, an estate planning, probate and elder law attorney in Jacksonville and has two amazing children. He enjoys spending time with his family. He also enjoys his hobby of restoring and showing his antique cars. Cameron is a member of the Southside Businessmen’s Club of Jacksonville, as well as a member of the Florida Cemetery Cremation and Funeral Association (FCCFA).

Facebook Google Plus

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *