LaGrange/Mims Community Cemetery
Posted by: 
overrover
N 28° 38.459 W 080° 50.255
17R E 515873 N 3168221
A Florida Heritage Site that marks the parcel of land allocated to the colored community of North Brevard in the early 1900's.
Waymark Code: WMFPV
Location: Florida, United States
Date Posted: 06/26/2006
Views: 44
In the early 1900's, a two acre parcel of land north of LaGrange Community Church and Cemetery was given to the Mims colored community for a cemetery. Earliest marked graves are dated 1903; many are unmarked. In the 1800s both blacks and whites worshipped at the LaGrange Community Church. In 1894, after organizing their own congregation, St James Colored Missionary Baptist Church acquired land in Mims and in 1904 built their own church. In June 1913, trustees of that church purchased this parcel from the East Coast Cattle Company to be used as a cemetery, then referred to as the Mims Colored Cemetery. Many of North Brevard's pioneering black families rest in this hallowed ground with family names of Abrams, Bell, Brothers, Brown, Campbell, Cuyler, Grant, Gibson, Highsmith, McKenzie, Mitchell, Seigler, Simms, Strickland, Warren, and Williams.
Most noted are the graves of Harry T. Moore and Harriette V. Simms Moore, civil rights activists. Moore was chapter president of Brevard County National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and later NAACP Florida Convention president/state coordinator. On Christmas Eve, 1951 the Moores were killed when their home, located near this site, was bombed.
Marker Number: F-488
Date: 2003
County: Brevard
Marker Type: Roadside
Sponsored or placed by: Brevard County Historical Society and Florida Department of State
Website: Not listed
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Visit Instructions:
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