Information about Athens city cemeteries will soon be converted to a digital format in order to improve grave identification and better preserve records needed by cemetery employees and the public.

The Muscle Shoals National Heritage Area has given the city a $19,600 grant to buy digitized cemetery software that will preserve historic and current cemetery records, said Holly Hollman, city grant coordinator.

The software will include a mapping system of graves and infrastructure, and it will combine burial records with photographs of headstones, she said.

The city’s Cemetery Department will pay $19,600 in matching money to receive the grant. The total project cost will be $39,200.