Evergreen Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's the marker's own account, the way I'd tell it around a good fire. A rural community of farming families once existed in this area of Houston County. They called it Evergreen, named for the numerous evergreen trees growing throughout the vicinity.

Picture that: a small farming settlement tucked in among those trees, quiet and green, with a little school and a church building serving as the gathering place for everyone who lived nearby. That's the whole of the town, right there. A schoolhouse, a church, and the people who needed both.

In 1879, two of those early settlers, R.T. and Susan Lively, gave land for that school. Now, here's the thing about land given for a school in a community like Evergreen. It tends to become more than just a school.

That same piece of ground became the site of a community graveyard. The earliest known burial recorded there is that of Philip Pipkin, born in 1817, laid to rest in 1886. Others who followed him into that cemetery include descendants of the Lively family and other pioneer families who had put down roots in this place.

The school is gone. The church building is gone. The community of Evergreen itself faded with time.

But those evergreen trees kept growing, and that cemetery kept its memory. Some places hold on the only way they know how.

What the marker says

A rural community of farming families once existed in this area. Known as Evergreen, it was named for the numerous evergreen trees in the vicinity. A small school and church building provided a gathering place for the community. Land given for the school in 1879 by early settlers R.T. and Susan Lively also became the site of a community graveyard. The earliest known burial to occur here was that of Philip Pipkin (1817-1886). Others interred in the cemetery include descendants of the Lively and other pioneer families.