Golf club built on slaves' graves sparks debate on how to honor the dead

[Dennis Donovan]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/dec/26/slaves-graves-golf-club-florida


Delaitre Hollinger, the immediate past president of the Tallahassee branch of the NAACP, visits the Capital City Country Club in Tallahassee, Florida, on 17 December. Photograph: AP

The rumors swirled for decades: a dark history long lay buried under the grassy knolls and manicured lawns of a country club in Florida’s capital city, Tallahassee.

Over the years, neat rows of rectangular depressions along the 7th fairway deepened in the grass, outlining what would be confirmed this month as sunken graves of the slaves who lived and died on a plantation that once sprawled with cotton near the Florida Capitol.

The discovery of 40 graves – with perhaps dozens more yet to be found – has spawned discussion about how to honor those who lie in rest at the golf course. And it has brought renewed attention to the many thousands of unmarked and forgotten slave cemeteries across the deep south that forever could be lost to development or indifference.

“When I stand here on a cemetery for slaves, it makes me thoughtful and pensive,“ said Delaitre Hollinger, the immediate past president of the Tallahassee branch of the NAACP. His ancestors worked the fields of Leon county as slaves.

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[safeinOhio]

1. Could we change all of the slave owners grave yards

into dog parks?
Just to be fair.

[harumph]

2. "How to honor..."

You CLOSE the golf course - first and then
Mark the graves second.

Why is this even a question of what to do????

[Dennis Donovan]

3. The saddest part of that equation is what it leaves out...

[Initech]

4. Yes but some things are just more important than the almighty dollar.

Like preserving cultural legacies, for instance.

[Dennis Donovan]

5. Of course. My OP was about something different?

[WhiskeyGrinder]

6. The fact that there is even a "debate" just goes to show how deep racism runs in this country.

[Hortensis]

7. On the plus side, the golf course may have preserved graves

that other development would have covered over or destroyed.

As it is, though, that section of the golf course needs to go. Offhand, I can't think of anything less appropriate than a bunch of privileged people of any color playing golf on the unmarked, dishonored graves of slaves.

With new technology, a bunch of old graves are going to be turned up. Imo, when they're graves of slaves or other victims, that needs to be a problem for those who own the land these days. My husband and I passed on purchasing a very pretty piece of land because of an old rumor that it was in some way sacred to Cherokee predecessors.