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About

Valhalla-Gaerdner-Holten Funeral Home and Valhalla Gardens of Memory serve families in Belleville, Illinois, and around St. Clair County. Working together, the funeral home and cemetery allow you to conveniently take care of all your funeral and burial arrangements.

Personal funeral planning

At Valhalla-Gaerdner-Holten Funeral Home, our team considers it a calling to serve grieving families. We offer understanding and care as we help you through the funeral planning process. With us, you have the option of a traditional or contemporary service that honors your loved one.

Every life has a story, and we showcase that story through personalized funeral and cremation services that reflect individuality. Our team welcomes the opportunity to help you create a service that celebrates life and brings peace to family and friends. We also offer refreshments and catering in our spacious event room.

Valhalla Gardens of Memory

Valhalla Gardens of Memory, located at 3412 Frank Scott Parkway West in Belleville, is a well-landscaped cemetery that occupies approximately 67 acres, offering families a peaceful and serene setting.

The cemetery grounds feature numerous trees, beautiful flowers, gentle hills, statues and a lake with live swans, ducks and other wildlife. Additional amenities include a veterans pool surrounded by markers of retired flags, an Avenue of Flags court and flush-to-the-ground monuments. We also offer committal services at our mausoleum.

The cremation garden

Opened in the fall of 2019, the cremation garden allows for more than 275 inurnments. Nestled on the west bank of Swan Lake and located directly in the center of the cemetery, the garden is home to a marble and granite ossuary columbarium and a cenotaph. The ossuary provides cremation memorialization for 49 loved ones. Individual and companion posts and tablets surround the columbarium, allowing many more families to create personalized cremation tributes.

Commitment to Belleville

The teams at Valhalla-Gaerdner-Holten Funeral Home and Valhalla Gardens of Memory remain active in the St. Clair County community. Each year, we host a silent Memorial Day service, featuring our Avenue of Flags that has over 1,500 flag displays and pays tribute to our veterans and military families.

Among the largest in the U.S., the Avenue of Flags tribute flies the original flag, in most cases, that was draped on the casket of veterans in alphabetical order with a special name tag attached. A printed program with a map is provided, so visitors and family members can find their loved one’s flag along the winding avenues of the cemetery. Every year, thousands visit this all-day silent tribute to veterans buried at Valhalla Gardens of Memory.

Valhalla-Gaerdner-Holten Funeral Home and Valhalla Gardens of Memory have served families for more than 85 years. It is our pleasure to provide you with the attention you need and the care you deserve. Please contact us to learn more about our funeral home and cemetery options.

We honor veterans

At Valhalla-Gaerdner-Holten Funeral Home and Valhalla Gardens, we understand the unique needs of America’s veterans and their families. As a Level Four Founding Community Partner with We Honor Veterans, we are honored to serve our nation’s heroes and take this responsibility seriously. We have taken steps to ensure our staff is knowledgeable of all the benefits available to military veterans and their families.

In addition, we host community events annually in honor of our veterans and work closely with local veterans organizations. With respect, integrity and dignity, we will walk you through the steps of creating a veteran’s memorial service that truly honors the life and sacrifice of your loved one.

History

Valhalla-Gaerdner-Holten Funeral Home in Belleville, Illinois, was founded in September 1930 by Jefferson Bush (J.B.) Azbill. For over 85 years, we have remained dedicated to helping families plan funeral and cremation services that celebrate their loved ones, growing into the full-service funeral home we are today.

Early years

The cemetery, which was originally known as Valhalla Burial Park, was the 1st memorial lawn burial park in southwestern Illinois. Development was made up of themed garden sections with spacious lots and walkways surrounded by various trees, bushes and flowers. Memorials were custom, decorative, flat bronze on concrete foundations to maintain a park-like setting.

Azbill passed away suddenly in 1936, after a short illness. His widow, Freda Azbill, took over management and development of the Belleville funeral home and cemetery. Freda remained active as president for 54 years until her death in 1990. Freda was responsible for producing and staging the Avenue of Flags in 1951.

Growing to serve families in Belleville

In 1959, the 1st section of the Valhalla Sanctuary Chapel of Memories Mausoleum was constructed. It included crypts and niches, was constructed of concrete for strength and included a beautiful custom stained-glass window made in Manheim, Germany. Several additions have been added over the years, including more stained-glass windows and statuary art from around the world.

As Valhalla Gardens of Memory grew, new garden sections were enhanced with beautiful full-size marble and bronze statues sculpted in Italy from the same quarries that artist Michelangelo used. One statue in particular, from the Garden of Ascension, was displayed during the 1964 World’s Fair in New York on its way to Belleville.

Local family tradition

David Evans, Freda Azbill’s grandson, who had joined the staff in 1978, took over management of the funeral home and cemetery park after her passing. He continued the construction of new sections, including an underground lawn crypt section, in-ground and above-ground cremation niche options, a crematorium and developed the Valhalla Garden Mausoleum, so families would have multiple choices for their final resting place.

In 1996, Valhalla-Gaerdner-Holten Funeral Home opened, offering families a wide range of funeral and cremation service options as well as memorialization choices and the convenience, if desired, of having the cemetery nearby.

Working together, everyone at Valhalla-Gaerdner-Holten Funeral Home and Valhalla Gardens of Memory is poised to continue our many decades of service to the greater Belleville and St. Clair County area.

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Amenities

Location

Flexible event space
Facility is available to host your personal events
Celebration of Life center
Facility is designed for personalized funeral celebrations
Veterans cemetery section
Beautiful views
Cemetery spaces available
Custom headstones and markers
Family estate lots
Family estates are a distinguished tribute to a family legacy. They can be customized with stained glass, benches and landscaping
Flat markers
Grave markers that sit flush to the ground in the material of preference
Mausoleums
Private or Community spaces for urns as well as caskets, that can be Indoor or outdoor
On-site cemetery

Cremation

Cremation remembrance jewelry
Cremation options
Cremation niches
Option for home delivery of ashes
Option for mail delivery of ashes
Sent through postal mail service, signature required.
Scattering assistance
Cremation gardens

Service

Arrangements by phone or email
Complete funeral planning, including electronic signature, without needing a funeral home visit
Catered events
Event planning
Services available to support planning events
Popular funeral music selections
Intimate gatherings
Meeting space
Space available for corporate and organization meetings
Marker unveiling
Ceremony where the tombstone is placed at your loved one’s gravesite
Overnight visitations
In-home visitations
Services available to coordinate visitation or viewing at a private residence
Black car service
Cemetery flower arrangement delivery

Other

100% service guarantee
Livestreaming of services

How may we help you?

Plan Ahead

A Death Is Near

A Death Has Occurred

GET CUSTOM QUOTE

INCLUDES EVERYTHING YOU NEED:

Filing for death certificates
Securing burial permits
Helping with insurance claims
Giving guidance on Social Security survivors benefits

Every detail remembered

100% SERVICE GUARANTEE
If for some reason you’re dissatisfied with any aspect of your service, we’ll refund that portion of the service.
LIFETIME FLEXIBILITY
If you want to make changes to a prepaid plan, we are always available to discuss your options.
RELOCATION PROTECTION
Our prepaid plans are transferable to any of the qualifying Dignity Memorial providers in North America.