Funeral homes originally began as humble little establishments for preserving and handling the dead during the Civil War and the undertakers were often members of the community such as barbers who did the job on a part-time basis. Nowadays, these are full-time jobs and the people handling the jobs are respectfully referred to as funeral directors. Today around 25% of the funerals are conducted by corporate owned chains of funeral homes and the big three such as Service Corporation International own literally thousands of homes and cemeteries.