Collier museum aims to bring respect to neglected and unmarked 1930s Black cemetery

A nearly forgotten slice of history is gaining new attention.
 The battles of segregation once not only applied to how and where people lived but also their final resting place.

On the corner of a busy intersection with lots of noise and traffic, with no sign or even a fence sits a cemetery. It sits on the southwest corner of Goodlette-Frank Road and Pine Ridge Road in Collier County.

“Here we actually stand on Plot N, which is the negro plot,” explained Vincent Keeys,

president of Collier County NAACP.

 “It’s one of the abandoned cemeteries across the state of Florida, and so, for such a long time I have been so embarrassed that we have yet to really honor the people who are buried here.”

He said this site saddens him, with eight unmarked graves. Eight African American people whose names and stories are lost in history.

At least one is believed to be a child, buried some time between 1930 and 1944, in a place where race mattered even in death.

Keeys added, “As so in life, as so it is in death, and so consequently, we lived during a time of segregation and therefore Blacks could not be buried in the same area as whites.”

When the segregated Rosemary Cemetery opened in 1930 it extended from US-41 east to the railroad tracks, now Goodlette-Frank Road. The land was donated by developer Ed Crayton.

Today, Collier County owns only a portion of the land, an all-white burial site on Pine Ridge Road and US-41 nearly in the CVS parking lot. It’s fenced in and fit with a historical marker, headstones, and the names of people who rest there.

A stark contrast can be seen from the upkeep at Plot W, another all-white portion of the cemetery, compared to Plot N.

Amanda Townsend with Collier County Museums wants to change that.

 “The parcel is privately owned so we are working with the heir of the property owner of record to acquire the parcel for the county to take it over, and then we would manage it the same way we do the Rosemary Cemetery that people know, in front of the CVS. We’d fence it and maintain it and put some headstones in.”

Keeys really hopes to see that happen.

He’s working with Townsend and the county to push for it. “It is part of our history. They are pioneers and should be honored accordingly.”

Townsend added, “It is certainly something that now we recognize as being inappropriate and we would like to bring our recognition of the importance of people’s lives to an equitable space.”

All this to transform an abandoned space on the side of a busy road, into a place that looks more like a cemetery. To properly honor all of those lost

.

Into a proper final resting place for those who died so long ago.

Townsend said Collier County Museums has been working towards acquiring Plot N and Plot W for about a year now.

They’re owned by the same private owner but there are lots of title issues to work out.

If, or when, the county acquires the land they’ll first start working on fencing and headstones.