Let’s keep track, shall we? The Dallas Morning News once had a digital managing editor who liked to say that Dallas writes its history with an eraser. With the other side of the pencil:
In 1872, the Hebrew Benevolent Association bought land from Mayor Henry Ervay for the purpose of establishing a Jewish cemetery at an elevated location of the city where flooding wouldn’t disturb the graves. Times change, though. In 1956, the remains of 53 Jewish people at that site were exhumed and moved to a spot at the Temple Emanu-El cemetery (at Howell and Hall) to make room for the Dallas Memorial Auditorium (now known as the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center). Henry S. Miller Sr. handled those negotiations; he had a relative buried there.
But hang on. In 1961 the old Jewish cemetery spot became the site of the Confederate monument. The monument originally stood at Old City Park but had to be moved to accommodate the construction of a highway named after RL Thornton, a noted member of the Ku Klux Klan. Here’s some documentation of this business.
Read Dylan Hollingsworth’s fine story about the dismantling of the Confederate monument. And know that our dearly departed surely applaud the move. (I assume dead people can clap.)
