A statue of Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. is in the center of the African-American Cultural Park in Texas City. Dr. King is wearing a cassock and holding a bible in one hand while his other is raised. The statue is on a concrete hexagonal base with two plaques:
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
(January 15, 1929 - April 4, 1968)
Special Thanks
City of Texas City Gratefully
Acknowledges Mary Ellen and
Charles “Chuck” Doyle For
Their Generosity In Providing
The Funding For The Dr. Martin
Luther King, Jr. Statue.
A plaque nearby reads:
First African-American Church Street
First Avenue South
February, 2000
We dedicate First Avenue South / Martin Luther King, Jr. Avenue in the memory of our many ancestors, families, friends and visitors who started their religious affirmations on First Avenue South at either Galilee Methodist Church, First Baptist Church or Barbour's Chapel Baptist Church during the first quarter of the century (1900) in Texas City. The spiritual legacy of those who pastored, preached, fellowshiped, or worshiped God on this street will never be forgotten.
Galilee United Methodist Church
1913 Bishop A. G. Brooks / Rev. H. F. Hynson, 2000
First Missionary Baptist Church
1914 Rev. Steve / Rev F. M. Johnson, 2000
Barbour's Chapel Baptist Church
1913 Rev. Barber / Rev. H. A. Ratcliff, 2000
___ ___ ___
A tribute to
Martin Luther King, Jr.
January 15, 1929 - April 4, 1968
This avenue where our Early African churches were constructed is named in the memory of a man of great moral presence who donated his life to the fight for full citizenship rights of the poor, disadvantaged and racially oppressed. He was the second of three children of the Rev. Michael and Mrs. Alberta Williams King of Atlanta Georgia. He received a bachelor's degree in sociology (1948) from Morehouse College, a bachelor's degree (1951) from Croscu Theological Seminary and a doctorate in philosophy (1955) from Boston University.
In 1954, King accepted his first pastorate at the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery Alabama. He and his wife, Coretta Scott King, whom he met and married (June 1953) at Boston University, had been living in Montgomery less than a year when Rosa Parks defied the ordinance concerning segregated seating on city busses (Dec 1955). King’s successful bus boycott, with the help of Rev. Ralph Abernathy and Edwin Dixon, capitulated him into national prominence as a leader for the Civil Rights movement.
King studied the life and teachings of Mahatma Gandhi and further develop the Indian leaders doctrine of Satyagraha (holding to the truth) on non-violent civil disobedience. In 1960 he accepted co-pastorship with his father at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta.
He worked on voter registration campaigns throughout the South and organized the massive March on Washington (August 28, 1963) where his brilliant “I Have a Dream” speech “subpoenaed the conscience of the nation before the judgement seat of morality”. In January 1964, TIME magazine chose King “Man of the Year”, the first black American so honored. The same year, he became the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. He led the harrowing march from Selma to Montgomery in March 1965. In Washington, he spoke out against the Vietnam War, which took funds from the war on poverty. In the midst of assisting striking workers in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4th, 1968, King was felled by an assassin's bullet. The nation was deprived of a towering symbol of moral and social progress. In 1983 King's birthday was designated a national holiday.
Marker prepared by Commissioner Lynn Ray Ellison, District 3
And Mayor Charles T. Doyle.
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New Park Will Honor Texas City's African American History
Galveston Daily News
by Kathryn Eastburn - June 20, 2019
TEXAS CITY
Texas City will dedicate the new African American Cultural Park on Saturday, commemorating the lives of the city’s black residents from the early 20th century through the 1960s and beyond.
“We called it the South Side,” said Lynn Ray Ellison, former city commissioner and one of a group of former South Siders who call themselves the Booker T. Washington Exes, alumni of Booker T. Washington School, closed in 1967 when public schools were integrated.
“In 1920, 504 families lived in that area,” Ellison said. “It was where African Americans had to live back then.”
In 1947, most houses in the South Side neighborhood were badly damaged or burned to the ground after the disastrous explosion at the Port of Texas City that killed an estimated 581 people and injured thousands.
Many of the Exes remember that day well. Some were in school. Some were at home. Some remember climbing on the back of flatbed trucks rolling through neighborhood streets and being carried to safety.
When neighborhood churches, businesses and families rebuilt, they had to raise the money to do it, Ellison said.
“There was no government funding for that kind of thing back then,” he said. “The churches sold fish dinners, sold pig feet to help people build back wooden A-frame houses.”
The Exes have been around for 40 years, since the neighborhood was demolished, Ellison said. In 2008, they approached the Texas Legislature during its 80th session and convinced lawmakers to pass a bill acknowledging defunct African American schools, like Booker T. Washington, for their roles in Texas history.
“We’ve led black history programs across the state,” Ellison said. “Lots of people came from the South Side and other places like it and went out and did outstanding things.”
Ellison and the Exes, along with Texas City’s Departments of Public Works and Parks, Recreation and Tourism, are responsible for planning and building the new park that has been 12 years in the making.
Of six churches that served the South Side for 50 years, only one remains in the area. The rest were moved when the city turned what once was the South Side into a “green belt” buffer between the industrial plants and city residences and businesses, said Dennis Harris, director of Parks, Recreation and Tourism.
Those six churches will all be commemorated in the park with large, permanent display cabinets featuring photographs and memorabilia from their congregations.
From a city storage warehouse, Harris was able to recover Greater Barbour’s Chapel Baptist Church’s original cornerstone and church bell, now permanently on display in the park.
The large stone name plate of Booker T. Washington School is also on display, along with a Texas Historical Commission marker that once stood in front of the school building.
Saturday’s dedication will feature the unveiling of a statue of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., donated by former Texas City Mayor Chuck Doyle and his wife, Mary Ellen. A section of Fourth Street North, from Texas Avenue south to 14th Avenue, will be renamed Martin Luther King Jr. Street, to tie the surrounding area to the park.
The African American Cultural Park is at the corner of Fourth Street and Third Avenue, just east of Loop 197.
It will stand as a memorial and an educational site, Ellison said.
“We’re about humanity and mankind,” he said. “We were taught to be active in the community when we were students at Booker T. Washington.
“There’s nobody among us that’s not familiar with African American history and we learned it there.”
© 2019 Galveston Newspapers, Inc.