Olivewood Cemetery, in

Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 in ...

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...

, lies near a bend in

White Oak Bayou White Oak Bayou is a slow-moving river in Houston, Texas. A major tributary of the city's principal waterway, Buffalo Bayou, White Oak originates near the intersection of Texas State Highway 6 and U.S. Highway 290 (the Northwest Freeway) and mea ...

, along the rail line to Chaney Junction, where the

First First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1). First or 1st may also refer to: *World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement Arts and media Music * 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and rec ...

and Sixth wards meet just northwest of

downtown ''Downtown'' is a term primarily used in North America by English speakers to refer to a city's sometimes commercial, cultural and often the historical, political and geographic heart. It is often synonymous with its central business distric ...

. The cemetery is an historic resting place for many freed slaves and some of Houston's earliest black residents.

History

In 1875, the land, which had previously been used for slave burials, was purchased by Richard Brock,

's first black

alderman An alderman is a member of a Municipal government, municipal assembly or council in many Jurisdiction, jurisdictions founded upon English law. The term may be titular, denoting a high-ranking member of a borough or county council, a council membe ...

. It opened as a cemetery for black Methodists in 1877. When Olivewood was platted, it was the first

African-Americans African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ensl ...

burial ground within the Houston

city limits City limits or city boundaries refer to the defined boundary or border of a city. The area within the city limit can be called the city proper. Town limit/boundary and village limit/boundary apply to towns and villages. Similarly, corporate limi ...

. Many 19th century influential African-Americans were buried in the cemetery, including Reverend Elias Dibble, first minister of Trinity United Methodist Church; Reverend Wade H. Logan, also a minister of the church; and James Kyle, a blacksmith; as well as Richard Brock. The cemetery includes more than 700 family plots around a graceful,

elliptical Elliptical may mean: * having the shape of an ellipse, or more broadly, any oval shape ** in botany, having an elliptic leaf shape ** of aircraft wings, having an elliptical planform * characterised by ellipsis (the omission of words), or by conc ...

drive that originated at an ornate entry gate. It contains graves of both the well-to-do and those who died in poverty; therefore, the grave markers run the gamut from elaborate Victorian monuments to simple, handmade headstones. Burials at Olivewood Cemetery continued through the 1960s. In 2003, after decades of neglect and abandonment, the "Descendants of Olivewood," a nonprofit organization, was established to take guardianship of the cemetery, "to provide care and to protect its historical significance." Olivewood was designated an Historic Texas Cemetery. By 2010 water and vandals threatened to damage graves in a portion of the cemetery. In 2013, a digital database for the cemetery was created (many memorials were created using the death certificates found at www.familysearch.org). This databases consists mostly of the years 1910–1940 and can be found at www.findagrave.com (link listed below). This database has about 3,800 memorials and can be searched by using first and/or last names. On July 15, 2021, the National Trust for Historic Preservation announced Olivewood Cemetery as one of 40 sites and organizations to receive $3 Million in grants from the

African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund The African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund is a program formed in 2017 to aid stewards of Black cultural sites throughout the nation in preserving both physical landmarks, their material collections and associated narratives. It was organiz ...

. The grant was awarded to create a master drainage plan to help mitigate further damage due to flooding and erosion caused by commercial development in the area.

Hauntings

Over the years, there have been numerous reports of mysterious after-dark sightings and strange movements within the graveyard. Cathi Bunn, a

paranormal investigator Ghost hunting is the process of investigating locations that are reported to be haunted by ghosts. Typically, a ghost-hunting team will attempt to collect evidence supporting the existence of paranormal activity. Ghost hunters use a variety of ...

, began exploring Olivewood in 1999. One moonlit midnight, Bunn said she videotaped the ghost of Mary White, who was buried in 1888, hovering above her headstone.

References

External links

Descendants of Olivewood
* {{coord, 29.774, -95.392, type:landmark_region:US-TX, display=title History of Houston Protected areas of Harris County, Texas Cemeteries in Harris County, Texas Cemeteries in Houston African-American history in Houston 1875 establishments in Texas African-American cemeteries Reportedly haunted locations in Texas