Fry Cemetery was established in 1919 as a private family cemetery when Elizabeth Ruth Cathcart Fry, wife of Oliver Fry, died on Christmas day, 1919. The Oliver Fry family first homesteaded in the area east of Ft. Huachuca in late 1912. The area at that time was called Overton, then later Garden Canyon. As the Fry family increased in prominence, the post office became know as Fry, Arizona. The area continued to grow. Fort Huachuca was closed following WWII, but reopened during the Korean Conflict. By 1955, residents began campaigning for incorporation. Edwin Fry, a son of Oliver Fry, resisted the effort. This may be because indications were the Fry name would not be kept. When incorporation of Sierra Vista became a reality in 1956, Edwin Fry and several of his friends refused to join in. Thus the Fry Townsite came to be a county enclave within Sierra Vista itself. To say that Fry, Arizona, became Sierra Vista would be an overstatement. It would be more correct to say that the incorporated Sierra Vista eclipsed the unincorporated Fry.

While the cemetery was intended for the use of Fry family members, others were permitted to be buried on the grounds with the permission of the family. Of the 199 non-family burials, most were local Hispanics and Yaqui Indians who provided much of the local work force. There are reports of up to 400 graves here, but that may include a sizable number of unwanted babies belonging to the women who worked in White City, the unofficial name of the local "red light district" serving locals and soldiers from the nearby fort.

The graves of the Fry family members were separated from the rest of the cemetery with the erection of a wall in 1961.

By 2006, there were reports that the cemetery property would be sold and developed. There was a move by local citizens to prevent this, and in 2007 the City of Sierra Vista purchased the parcel located in a county enclave. It became a National Historic Site in 2010.

There are currently 14 marked graves of Fry family members within the walls. There is only one marked grave outside the walls, that of Pvt. Jose L. Perez.

A list of the names and locations of those buried at Fry Cemetery is kept by the City of Sierra Vista's Henry Hauser Museum.