Officials Look For More Lost Black Pauper's Cemeteries In Tampa

HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, FL — The disposition of a black pauper's cemetery on the campus of King High School in Tampa is now in the hands of a state archaeologist, as reports of other lost cemeteries in Tampa Bay are investigated.

On Nov. 20, the Hillsborough County Schools announced that at least 145 coffins dating to the 1940s were detected by ground-penetrating radar on the south side of the school campus on 56th Street. The coffins are in what's believed to be Ridgewood Cemetery, a potter's field for poor black residents in Tampa during a time when cemeteries were segregated.

Following research into burial records and death certificates, Hillsborough County Medical Examiner Dr. Kelly G. Devers was called in to review and research the information, and concluded that the bodies were all properly interred following their deaths.

“The layout of the 145 suspected graves … is consistent with what would be expected in a cemetery," Devers said.

Devers has now referred the matter to state archaeologist Dr. Mary Glowacki for further action.

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The school district began investigating the cemetery in October after Tampa historian Ray Reed discovered some old deeds for the cemetery, which was owned and maintained by the city of Tampa and contained between 250 and 286 graves.

The school's agriculture lab facilities and an agricultural workshop were built on top of the cemetery after the school district purchased the land in 1959.

The district has formed a Historical Response Committee composed of community group representatives and faith-based leaders, as well as city, county and state elected officials, to determine how to acknowledge the cemetery's existence.

Hillsborough County Schools Superintendent Jeff Eakins called the discovery of the graves at the high school a tragedy and said the district will do whatever it can to honor the memory of those buried on the property.

"You're looking at the way African Americans were treated in the Jim Crow era, and the fact that they were not even respected in their burials," Eakins said. "We want to make sure we bring their voices back in some way."

The discovery at the King High School campus came after the revelation over the summer that the Robles Park Village housing project on North Florida Avenue in Tampa had been constructed on top of the all-black Zion Cemetery containing at least 182 graves. The city is now relocating the residents of the housing project.

The discoveries of the lost cemeteries have prompted a countywide search for other pauper's burial grounds that once appeared on county maps but are no longer shown.

Historical records indicate that some graves may have been relocated. However, historians believe that, in some cases, structures were built on top of the cemeteries.

Among them are two black cemeteries, marked as "colored," that appeared on a 1941 report on Tampa cemeteries issued by the federal Works Progress Administration.

Among them is the Port Tampa Cemetery, which may be located at MacDill Air Force Base; and the Keystone Memorial Park Cemetery, off Gunn Highway in Odessa.

The Port Tampa Cemetery is believed to predate construction of MacDill Air Force base in 1939 and could contain graves from as early as 1902. Old records show the cemetery was located at the intersection of Interbay Boulevard and Manhattan Avenue.

The Air Force base has called in an archaeology firm to try to locate the lost graves after the first of the year.

Historians are also trying to locate the Keystone Memorial Park Cemetery, containing the graves of 75 black families who settled in Odessa in the early 1900s. The cemetery is believed to have been located near the site of the Citrus Park Colored School, which was open from 1921 to 1966, and Mount Pleasant AME Church.

Other sites investigated include a property owned by Sunstate Wrecker Services at 3800 N. Florida Ave., Tampa; a neighboring property owned by Richard Gonzmart, founder of the Columbia restaurant; and the Hillsborough County Tax Collector's Office at 2814 E. Hillsborough Ave. However, ground-penetrating radar has detected no graves so far on those properties.