Mountain View Cemetery Application

Overview

Mountain View Cemetery has served the City of Vancouver since 1887. Located west of Fraser Street between 31st and 43rd Avenues, the cemetery's beautiful vistas and central location make it a place where many Vancouverites have chosen to honour the memories of their family and friends, and gone for quiet contemplation. It's also a unique, open space where city history is preserved. Owned and operated by the City of Vancouver since 1887, Mountain View is made up of 106 acres of land with approximately 92,000 grave sites and 145,000 interred remains.

For more information about Mountain View Cemetery see the website.

This application allows you to search and locate the grave of those buried at the cemetery.

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Step 1 - Open the Mountain View Cemetery Application:

Select the Mountain View Cemetery Application from the Applications list box in the VanMap menu bar. Doing so will open up the floating Mountain View Cemetery Application window (below). If you need to move the Mountain View Cemetery Application window you can do so by clicking on (and holding) the blue band and dragging the window to a new location.

Step 2 - Searching the Cemetery

Searching for Mountain View Cemetery information can be done in two ways using either name or location information. A name search is the most common, and easiest search.

Name Search:

A name search for Hodges % returns these results

The map view looks like this.

Along with the map (above), a separate window (below) appears with the details of the interment in the highlighted lot. You can double-click on adjacent lots to find out who's buried there or use the button in the window to list all in the plot.

Clicking on the Back button will return you to the previous screen. You may need to use the Back button on a couple of windows before returning to the search screen.

Location Search

A location search is rarely used. You need to be sure you have the correct and full information before using the location search. A name search is preferable.

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Step 3 - What does the information mean

With a successful search the result may look like this. Most of the information is self explanatory but the location field might need clarification.

 

There are typically 5 fields used to describe a grave (Section / Range / Block / Plot / Lot). The"/" is used to separate these values. All graves have a section and lot value, some may have a range, block and/or plot value. If they do not the * is used.

Section: This is the largest grouping in the cemetery. There are nine sections: Horne 1, Horne2, Old, Abray, Jones, Masonic, IOOF, KP and 1919. A section contains a number of ranges and/or blocks. Check this map for a generalised view of the sections.

Range: Only the Horne1 and Old sections use the Range field, all others have a * after the first "/". A range is a grouping of blocks within a section.

Block: This is next level of grouping within each section. A section can be divided into a few as 6 or as many as 47 blocks. Section 1919 uses letters A through F to identify blocks. Masonic and IOOF sections do not use blocks.

Plot: this is the smallest grouping within the cemetery. A typical plot contains 16 lots (numbered 0001 through 0016). however, some plots contain more (such as 0001A or 00016A) and others contain less. The layout of these 16 lots within each plot also varies depending on the section. Most lots are located in a plot however, there are several graves between the plots in former pathways that are grouped at the block level.

Lot: A lot is an individual location commonly refered to as the grave.

In the above example the person would be found in Section Horne 2 Block 7 Plot 22 Lot 10

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What else can you do

When you are in the map view there are a number of cemetery related items you can turn on and off. In the legend, look for the Cemetery layer. Double-clicking the layer group icon or the name will expand the list. Select the items you wish to show on the map.

Note: some items will only appear at specific zoom levels. At the bottom of the legend look for the orthophotos layers. Here you can turn on various images of the cemetery, and of the city.

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