By Andrew Hoffman
Personalizing the funeral service can show the uniqueness of a life well lived. In my last column, I went over some of the options available to help remember the individual in new ways. This includes caskets, vaults, urns and cemetery stones.
Caskets can be adorned with religious items, sports memorabilia, or the love of a hobby. Some are designed after a movie theme or even a rock band.
I am willing to bet that some coffin manufacturers first got their inspiration from the fabulous coffins of Ghana. For the Ga tribe in coastal Ghana, funerals are a time of mourning, but also of celebration. The people of Ghana believe that when their loved one dies they move on to another life and the relatives make sure they do so in style. They honor their dead with brightly colored coffins that celebrate the way they lived or what was important to them. Funerals are often uplifting occasions in Ghana, where it is widely believed that death is the beginning of a beautiful afterlife and should receive “a rapturous sendoff”. The tradition in the culture is called “abebuu adekai”, which means proverb coffins. It pays tribute to the occupant with personalization and often spectacular design.
Supposedly the first proverb coffin (abebuu adekai) was created in the 1950’s when a palanquin carriage was made for a tribal leader in the shape of a cocoa pod. But the leader died suddenly, and quick thinking subjects buried him in the pod. Today there are many proverb coffin manufacturers and artists in Ghana that produce gorgeous coffins that are works of art. One such manufacturer is The Kane Kwei Carpentry Workshop which produced their first coffin for the owner’s grandmother in the form of a jet plane because she had never traveled by plane but was fascinated by the new mode of transport. Hence, her grandson made the coffin for his deceased grandmother to take her spirit from this world to the next. They make coffins in the shape of planes, fish, cameras, cars, birds, lizards and other animals.
So if your one of the many people that tell me that you want a Viking funeral burning long boat and all (which is illegal), you may want to consider having a casket or coffin made in the shape or likeness of a long boat and then be buried in it or cremated in it (legally) at a crematory. Or maybe you have other ideas as to your design or wishes, I have a client family that wants to be buried in a green cemetery in a whiskey barrel. So long as it is not illegal or immoral Jeffries and Keates is willing to make it happen and I would think other funeral homes hopefully feel the same way. This finishes the first part of my article on merchandise personalization possibilities in funeral service. The second part of this article dealing with vaults, urns and cemetery stones I hope you will find just as interesting. To close out I believe that every person has a unique life that they lived and a wonderful story to tell. One of the ways to tell it is through your casket at the funeral service and I encourage you all to step outside the box (no pun intended) and tell it in your own unique way. Bye for now and see you in the next article.
Andrew B. Hoffman is a funeral director at Jeffries and Keates and Keates-Plum Funeral Homes. He is a twenty-two year veteran of the funeral industry.
