An increasing number of cemeteries are starting to allow quick response codes on grave markers.
In an industry where the trends are known not to change very quickly or frequently, mobile technology has brought a new option in the form of QR codes, to allow mourners to be able to memorialize their loved ones with far more space than is available on the gravestone, itself.
These quick response codes can be scanned by smartphones with a free reader app, to learn more about the deceased.
Among the most recent examples of the use of memorial QR codes was created by Joe Davies, who added one of the barcodes to the gravestone of his father. The cemetery is located in Bridgend, Wales. Davies explained that his father, Charles James Davies, is a war hero. He wanted to give visitors to the cemetery the opportunity to be able to learn more about his father’s life.
The gravestone QR codes can be quickly and easily scanned using smartphones or tablets.
When the barcode on Charles Davies’s grave is scanned, it directs the device user to a webpage about the man and his life. The grave marker itself provides little more information than the fact that he was born in 1921 and died at the age of 91, last year. However, scanning the barcode shows that he was also formerly a merchant seaman who was in World War 2, participating in Arctic convoys.
Those highly dangerous missions were referred to as the “journey to hell” and took the lives of over 3,000 men. These trips ran from 1941 to 1945 to bring supplies to the Soviet Union. Joe Davies felt that it was important to share this and other details of his father’s “incredible life”. As an IT worker, he came across programs for using these smartphone friendly quick response barcodes in public parks to provide information about the trees and plants. This gave him the idea regarding the simplicity of using this same method for sharing his father’s story.
The QR codes for Charles Davies provide cemetery visitors with a considerable amount of information about the individual as well as insight into this specific perspective on the second World War and the life of someone who had been hunted by German U boats. It includes audio files, as well as family tribute clips and some reminiscences from friends.
