Few sites in Waco capture the richness and complexity of the city’s history better than First Street Cemetery. The city’s oldest resting place, it holds the remains of many of Waco’s prominent early residents. However, its caretaking and development leave a checkered legacy. Located along the south bank of the Brazos River, Waco established the “City Cemetery” to inter the remains of its citizens. Beginning in 1852, what became First Street Cemetery progressed in four stages as the city’s expanding population necessitated more burial space. The local Masonic Lodge buried its members there. In 1868, the International Order of Odd Fellows—another fraternal organization—purchased additional land in which to inter its members. Then finally, a permit from the city government in 1882 allotted space for “colored persons.” Despite these enlargements, the cemetery suffered from overcrowding. Bodies were often buried on top of one another and gravesites were poorly marked. It is the lack of care that distinguished First Street Cemetery from other burial sites in Waco. Unlike other cemeteries in town, First Street did not possess an association charged with maintaining the space. From its inception, the graveyard suffered from perpetual neglect, vandalism, and, due to its riverside location, flooding. The City of Waco struggled to consistently address these issues.

News reports at the turn of the twentieth century expressed Wacoans’ frustrations at the dilapidated condition of the cemetery. As a result, the surviving families of some people interred at First Street elected to rebury remains at another location. The poor state of the cemetery, combined with the lack of records on the space, increasingly made it into a site considered for new development. In 1967, the City of Waco received federal funding to turn a portion of the cemetery into Fort Fisher and the Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum. To do so required the relocation of headstones and remains in the area slated for development. Some Wacoans expressed mixed feelings about the transfer, but received assurances from the city that burial sites were receiving proper care. After the relocation, construction commenced and Fort Fisher opened to the public in 1968. However, the choices made during renovation reverberated into the twenty-first century. In 2006, the city granted permission for the expansion Fort Fisher to include a building for the Texas Ranger Company “F” Headquarters. The city hired an archeologist to study the proposed site prior to construction. After a cursory examination, he recommended that building commence. Work on the site did not last long. The digging of initial trenches in 2007 quickly uncovered remains, demonstrating that the 1967 construction only relocated headstones, not those interred there. It also disclosed a lack of due diligence in the archeological study done for the expansion. A team of forensic anthropologists and archeologists soon arrived in Waco and began excavating and analyzing the site. Over several years, the process uncovered the remains of over two hundred people. They contained important insights about nineteenth-century burial practices, like the frequent appearance of ornamental coffins that indicated the internment of people with some means. Wacoans responded to these revelations by banding together to ensure the dead and their remains were treated with dignity and respect. Composed of a cross-section of the Waco community, the First Street Cemetery Memorial Advisory Committee formed in 2013 to address the practical issues raised by the revelations about the development of the graveyard. Throughout their five years of operation, the committee proved instrumental in finding a reburial site for the remains at Rosemound Cemetery and placing a historical marker at the site. As a sign of care and respect, they chose to reinter the remains in cedar coffins rather than cardboard boxes. The report they filed and the public meetings they conducted helped keep the community informed and engaged with the activities at the cemetery.

Maintaining the cemetery continues to be a challenge into the present. Headstones and plots manifest different degrees of care. To date, no community organization has received permission from the city to maintain the cemetery.

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For over a century, Greenwood Cemetery has stood as a final resting place for many Wacoans and as an important marker for city history.

Established as a segregated cemetery in 1875, Greenwood sits just off of I-35 Business 77. Some of Waco’s most notable African American citizens—including the great baritone Broadway singer Jules Bledsoe, accomplished professor Dr. Vivienne Lucille Malone-Mayes, and Negro League Baseball star Andrew Lewis Cooper—lie in rest there. The cemetery also holds graves for both Union and Confederate soldiers who fought in the Civil War, as well as a mass grave of victims from the 1918 influenza epidemic during World War I. However, a chain-link fence separated the white and black graves until the twenty-first century. Though no one can remember the origin of the fence, it stood for many years as a harsh reminder of racial inequality.

For much of Greenwood’s history, volunteers maintained the cemetery. The People’s Cemetery Association cared for the black side of the cemetery until 2007, and the East Waco Greenwood Cemetery Association cared for the white side until 2014. Despite the efforts of these volunteers, each association experienced difficulty in securing funds and membership to adequately care for the cemetery. Both associations ultimately voted to turn over care of the cemetery to the city of Waco.

Greenwood has served Waco for more than 125 years and time has taken its toll. Although most people today use gravestones, financial struggles led some families in the past to use wood or random objects as markers, and some did not use a marker at all. The use of materials other than stone led to significant deterioration among many grave markers, making it difficult for families to locate loved ones.

The East Waco community has been calling for the preservation of Greenwood Cemetery for many years. Upon taking full control of the cemetery in 2014, the City of Waco promised to maintain and preserve this piece of history as well as improve it and make it more attractive and safe. In addition to cleaning up and caring for the space, the city pledged to replace a stolen historical marker, create a more attractive entrance to the cemetery, and remove the controversial fence segregating graves.

However, a lack of clear ownership for much of the land in the cemetery and a concern that unmarked graves might exist below the fence delayed its removal. After two years of research and work with the Texas Historical Commission, the City of Waco removed the chain-link fence in June 2016. The posts remain until the city is able to obtain the services of an archaeologist to ensure that unmarked graves are not disturbed by their removal.

Though the removal of the fence represents a move toward unity and preservation, the work is not finished. East Wacoans and park officials are still striving to ensure that a fence enclosing and unifying the entire cemetery is built, a more attractive entrance created, and appropriate signage developed so that the story of this important place in East Waco is not forgotten.

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Over the years, Hebrew Rest has served as a place of comfort and remembrance for Jews in Waco. More than just a burial place, the cemetery’s headstones speak to the city’s rich Jewish heritage.

One of Waco’s founding fathers, Jacob de Cordova, was a Jewish immigrant from Jamaica. He is the first in a long line of Jewish citizens that have called Waco home. Located in Central Texas, Waco seems to be an unlikely landing spot for European Jewish immigrants since it is not a major metropolitan city. However, people of Jewish heritage have been finding their way to Waco since the mid-1800s.

Scores of Jewish immigrants came to America in the late nineteenth century in order to escape the pogroms in Poland that saw Eastern European Jews persecuted and killed for their religious beliefs. To many of these newcomers to Texas, Waco appeared to have limitless potential. Its cotton industry, railroads, and proximity to cities such as Dallas and Austin made Waco a very desirable place to settle. Committed to helping their new town grow and prosper, these early Jewish citizens opened businesses and retail stores. Perhaps the most well-known of these early Waco businesspeople are Isaac Goldstein and Louey Migel. Together, they founded the Goldstein-Migel Department Store, a commercial center that remained a staple in the Waco business community for many years.

The first Jewish organization to appear in Waco was the Hebrew Benevolent Association. As a philanthropic association, it regularly provided aid to newly arrived Jewish residents in Waco. Members voted for the Hebrew Benevolent Association to purchase the original land for the Hebrew Rest Cemetery on August 13, 1869. The land is located on what was then South First Street.

More land was added to Hebrew Rest in 1893. Waco’s growing Jewish population towards the end of the twentieth century necessitated this expansion, but even then space remained scarce. To ensure placement, families often reserved burial plots long before their loved ones passed away. Each burial plot in the cemetery is privately owned by the family or individual who purchased it. Therefore, the cemetery holds great meaning to those families who have loved ones resting within its fences.

In 1931, the Hebrew Benevolent Association became the Hebrew Rest Association. This transfer was due to the growing number of Jewish private groups and charity organizations that wanted to help maintain the cemetery. Members of the association have tirelessly maintained the grounds of the cemetery since its founding.

Hebrew Rest celebrated its centennial in 1969 with a religious ceremony held at the cemetery. The well-known rabbi of Temple Rodef Sholom, Mordecai Podet, oversaw the event. The celebration represented a century of solemn dedication and fervent support from Waco’s Jewish community.

Although the cemetery’s surroundings have changed with the construction of Interstate 35 and the growth of Baylor University, the small plot of revered land remains the same.

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