More than 200 veterans' graves restored at Historic Fairview Cemetery

As the sun shined brightly in the Tuesday morning sky, four members of the American Legion Post 13 rifle detail stood at attention. In front of them stood roughly 205 graves, each of them marking a New Mexican veteran.

Each grave featured a pearl white tombstone shooting out of the red rocks that surrounded it. Etched in each tombstone were the veteran’s name, rank, the war in which the veteran served, and the date of birth and death.

The sound of shifting rocks could be heard as members of the New Mexico Department of Veterans Services, Bernalillo County and the public walked through the rows of graves, stopping periodically to reflect and pay their respects.

Opened in 1881, Historic Fairview Cemetery in Southeast Albuquerque is the final resting place for 299 New Mexican veterans, buried there between 1926 and 1988. .

While it may have been hard to believe based on how it looked on Tuesday, there was a time when these veterans’ graves were in a state of disrepair, according to Lisa Roberts, a board member of the Historic Fairview Cemetery.

“Prior to this, the ground was unlivable, the headstones were in poor condition,” she said. “We had veterans that were very concerned.”

Roberts and her fellow board members have charged themselves with the upkeep of the cemetery, but admittedly could only do so much to improve the veterans’ graves.

Everything changed, however, when John Garcia, a veteran and then-deputy assistant secretary for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, visited his father’s grave at the cemetery.

“The whole place was covered with weeds, and the graves were toppled over. And working for Veteran Affairs and working at the VA where it’s etched on the walls that we support the men and women and make sure they’re buried or the gravesite is maintained in perpetuity, we need to honor our veterans,” Garcia said.

Garcia decided to partner with the cemetery board and approached Bernalillo County Manager Julie Morgas Baca, whose father was also a veteran, for county funds to help restore the veterans’ graves.

Morgas Baca took the request for funds to the Bernalillo County Commission, which approved a one-time $300,000 appropriation to the cemetery in October 2022.

Armed with the funds, the cemetery began the restoration project at two veteran burial sites at Fairview — American Legion I and American Legion II.

American Legion I houses the graves of 94 veterans and includes the Monument to the Unknown Dead veteran, and American Legion II is home to the graves of the aforementioned 205 identified veterans. Broken tombstones were replaced, weeds were pulled and the graves were now filed in perfect straight rows.

Morgas Baca, who received a folded American flag for her efforts in helping to secure funding, was on hand on Tuesday to celebrate the completed restoration of the grave sites.

“I want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart and for making that (funding) request and giving us the privilege of honoring our heroes, who will never be forgotten,” Morgas Baca said.

With the two veteran burial sites now fully restored, the Historic Fairview Cemetery board is now turning its attention to restoring the graves of 250 other veterans resting across the cemetery. The board is raising funds for this through several upcoming events, including their Victorian Tea Party at the cemetery on April 28.

“We’ve made great progress helping maintain the cemetery and sharing its history,” Gail Rubin, Historic Fairview Cemetery board president, said. “That’s our mission.”

Photos: Veterans' graves restored at Historic Fairview Cemetery