Guardians of peace in bronze - creation of Freedman's Memorial burial site and sculpture park in Dallas to preserve a cemetery for freed slaves; includes related article on sculptor David Newton who designed the sculpture for the site

They were the last to hear the good news, but it didn't matter, because freedom realized late was still freedom. So when the word of emancipation finally reached Texas plantations on June 19, 1865, newly freed slaves hitched up their horses, their wagons and their hopes to the promise of a future. By the thousands they walked or drove on rough roads in the blazing sun to a town that offered work, pleasure, and the amenities of life outside of bondage. The burgeoning town of Dallas promised freedom -- and the dignity and honor that came with it. However, freedom's rights and privileges often eluded the former slaves in Dallas, even after they had been laid to rest. Over the years, the parcel of land in which the former slaves buried their dead, the Freedman's Cemetery, was destroyed beyond a recognizable trace.

Now, more than a century after the cemetery was dedicated, in 1869, a park and sculpture garden pay tribute to the early black settlements of Dallas -- and in particular to the black settlers whose graves were lost over the years to die heavy hand of urban progress.

It seems always to be the case: The city's oldest black cemetery lies m the path of one or another project o@ railroad, street or highway construction, and headstones and graves are desecrated, destroyed or used as landfill. This happened to the Freedman's Cemetery in the 1930s and again in the 1940s, but when more recent plans for progress threatened the resting place of black Dallas' pioneering ancestors, it met with a hue and cry from a community of concerned citizens.

In the late 1980s, Central Expressway, Dallas' main north-south thoroughfare, was slated for expansion. Robert Prince, a Dallas physician who grew up near the original cemetery in the district of Dallas once known as Freedman's Town, was one of many to raise his voice in protest when the city announced plans to expand the freeway without considering the fate of the community of the deceased, whose resting place would, once again, be violated in the name of progress.

Prince is a fourth-generation Texan. "My people were released from slavery here," he recalls, and he adds that about seven relatives were buried in the Freedman's Cemetery. "I can remember when I was a small boy in the 1930s, my father took me to show me the cemetery, and he was outraged that they were going to take the graves away. They were offering $10 a grave, and they would move them wherever you wanted them to be moved."

Prince returned to Dallas from medical school in 1964 to learn that the Freedman's Cemetery had been replaced by a park. "I protested independently," he says. "I went to Parks Commission meetings, and I got a lot of help from people who didn't believe that the cemetery should be desecrated."

That was then. This time, while individuals in Dallas formed small islands of protest, others used organizational power to bring attention to the injustice. Prince served as co-chairman of the Freedman's Foundation, an organization whose job was to raise the needed $2 million in private donations for the park and sculpture garden. But he couldn't do that before Black Dallas Remembered, a community group organized to gather and disseminate historical information about Dallas' blacks, actively lobbied for some type of recognition of the cemetery. Mamie McKnight, the founder and president of Black Dallas Remembered and a former member of the Dallas Landmark Commission, also became involved in the protest in the late '80s. She wrote to the Texas Highway Commission, raising the question of the widening of the expressway and the impact on the historic cemetery beneath it.

"That is our purpose at Black Dallas Remembered," she says, "to act as a liaison between the city and the community and to keep the community informed of projects that involve our history."

McKnight, Prince and others in the community lobbied for an agreement that city bulldozers would never again unearth the historic plot and that, for the first time in its history, the cemetery would be treated with dignity. The city agreed, and plans were under way for the memorial. "We felt very strongly that there should be no further intrusions on the cemetery and that what was left there should be preserved," says McKnight.

The city of Dallas, under the vigilant eye of the Dallas County Historical Commission and Black Dallas Remembered, agreed to a dignified removal and reinterment of the estimated 1,500 graves. Excavations began, and though approximately 1,500 graves were counted, archaeologists estimate the total population of graves to be well above that number. Excavators also found evidence of burial practices consistent with traditions of the times. All of the graves faced east, children were buried with their playthings, and adults were buried with artifacts suggesting African burial (cowrie shells, broken plates, and buttons, including buttons belonging to a black soldier buried in his Confederate uniform).

The newly formed Freedman's Arts Council and Foundation issued a call for designs of a fitting monument to be erected on the new site,. to be designated the Freedman's Memorial. The winning design was submitted by Detroitborn sculptor David Newton (see sidebar, page 28).

In October, Newton's five larger-than-life-size sculptures of Africans and African Americans cloistered under a stone archway will preside over the 1.2-acre reinterment site to form a sculpture garden and haven of solitude and reflection for families, visitors, and descendants of the city's black pioneers. A weekend of inaugural events beginning in February will feature a dedication, sunrise service, and children's reception at the site.

Newton's massive sculptures are classical in style and show Africans -- warriors, griots, guardians and freed slaves -- in various contemplative poses. "I wanted to show the genesis of African life in America," he says. "I wanted a narrative feel so that the sculptures would tell a story from slavery to freedom."

The cast-bronze pieces show a range of facial and physical emotions and portray an evolution of black life from free Africans to enslaved Africans in America and, finally, to free African Americans. The narrative begins in Africa, with sculptures of free black men and women in their homeland. "At the entrance to the archway, there are symbolic male and female figures -- a warrior ["The Sentinel"] and a griot ["The Prophetess"]. The griot keeps the history alive, and the warrior protects the cemetery, so that it will never be destroyed again," says Newton.

Other figures represent the indignities and abuses of slavery: a male straining against chains (page 24); a violated woman in the posture of shame; and a slave with whip lashes on his back ("Dream of Freedom"). This final sculpture depicts figures dressed in everyday 19th-century clothing, ready to begin living lives as freedmen. These figures represent the pioneering denizens of post-Civil War Texas.

"David's work shows the true spirit of suffering and that Africans suffered tremendously in bondage," says Prince. "His work is not only beautiful, but very graphic. It brought tears to my eyes."

The Freedman's Memorial does not come a moment too soon for a city that has, in the past decade alone, dealt with a multitude of issues marked by racial tension, from city council representation and controversial political redistricting to a divided school board. Planners of the project hope that the memorial will help unify the city's diverse population and salve some of its racial wounds.

"In the past there has been a history of communities fighting against each other," says Brooks Fitch, chairman of the Freedman's Arts Council and president of the Freedman's Foundation, "but this has become a city of communities coming together to work on this project. We hope this will be a springboard for the enhancement of relations between Dallas' diverse communities."

"I think the whole project will give us something to be very proud of," says historian and former Dallas Historical Commissioner Donald Payton, whose great grandfather, one of the early pioneers of Freedman's Town, is buried in the cemetery. "The monument is everything that Dallas should symbolize: blacks and whites coming together to recognize the contributions of those who make Dallas the city that it is."

David Newton Sculptor

David Newton was selected to create the Freedman's Memorial from a nationwide pool of 73 applicants. The selection panel, composed of nationally recognized arts professionals as well as representatives from the community, selected for semifinalists to prepare specific proposals. It was the panel's decision that Newton's design best reflected the vision for the memorial, "A Legacy of Creative Achievement." The clarity of his presentation, the sensitivity that he displayed toward the nature of the project and the site, and the fact that he approached the project as the creation of a place, not just a piece of art, were among the most persuasive factors. The recommendation of the selection jury, chaired by internationally known artist Jacob Lawrence, was unanimous.

Newton earned his master of fine arts degree from the New York Academy of Art in the Graduate School of Figurative Art, and the furthered his studies in Florence, Italy, at Studio Art Centers International. His public art experience includes commissions in Highland Park, Mich., as well as work as an assistant sculptor on the exterior friezes for the Ball Park at Arlington, Texas. He also participated in the exhibition "Reflections, a Legacy Unearthed," focusing on the African Burial Ground in New York City.

Rosalyn M. Story is the author of And So I Sing: African-American Divas of Opera and Concert. Her last article for American Visions, "Have Baton, Will Travel, appeared in the February/March 1993 issue.

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