Denton County has a rich
African-American history. In 1875, about 27 African-American families from
the Dallas settlement of White Rock came to Denton looking for a better
life. They settled about 2 ½ miles southeast of the county courthouse in
the area around where the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center is today. They
called this new settlement Freedman Town. The citizens of Freedman Town
began building their community by establishing businesses and churches. By
the 1880s African-American citizens began buying property and building
houses and churches along Oakland Avenue just north of McKinney Street.
This location was much closer to the central business district of downtown
Denton. They named this new settlement Quakertown, after the abolitionist
Quakers who helped slaves on the Underground Railroad. Quakertown continued
to grow through the 1890s and soon encompassed the land bordered by Bell
Avenue to the east, Withers Street on the north, Oakland Avenue on the west,
and just south of Pecan Creek on the south. More and more African-American
citizens moved into the area and by the 1910s Quakertown was a thriving
community with several businesses and more than 50 middle and working class
families.
The end of Quakertown
began in 1920. The area Quakertown occupied was in the flood plain halfway
between the College of Industrial Arts (now TWU) and Denton’s downtown
square. Ever since the college was established in 1903, there was a rumble
as to the removal of the African-American community from the shadows of the
women’s college. As the college began to grow and looked to the state for
recognition, it saw the close proximity of Quakertown as a hindrance to its
accreditation. Coincidentally, the civic groups of Denton, spearheaded by
the local women’s clubs, were searching for sites for a city park and fair
grounds. CIA President C. F. Bralley suggested Quakertown as the perfect
location. In January 1921, a petition went out calling for a bond election
to purchase the Quakertown property for the city park. The election was
held April 5, 1921 and with 607 votes cast, 367 were for the creation of the
park and 240 were against. With very little say, the residents of
Quakertown had lost their neighborhood.
Quakertown was not the
only African-American community in the city of Denton in 1920.
African-American residents still lived in Freedman Town, on Congress and
Egan Streets, along Bois d’Arc (now Industrial) and Prairie Streets, and in
an area called Peach Orchard Hill (located near the present TWU golf course
along Mingo Road). But Quakertown was the center of all of these
communities. Within Quakertown were the churches, the school, the
businesses, the doctor and the funeral home. It was a strong rooted
community that was shattered with its closing and the creation of Civic
Center Park. The story of Quakertown is a shameful chapter in the history
of Denton County.
In July 1922, rancher A.
L. Miles offered the displaced citizens of Quakertown a new place to call
home. Miles had platted 35 acres of pasture and offered it for sale. He
called this new development Solomon Hill. This area was an extension of
East Oak and East Hickory Streets and featured such cross streets as Wood
and Crawford named for African-American settlers. Solomon Hill had little
to offer in 1922. It was a converted cow pasture with no utilities and a
severe mosquito problem. Even so, many Quakertown residents purchased land
from Miles and either constructed new homes or moved houses from
Quakertown. Solomon Hill eventually grew into other additions and
overlapped with the original Freedman Town and the area along Lakey Street
that was once known as Shacktown. The former residents of Quakertown and
others created a new neighborhood with the same strong community spirit in
the area we now know as Southeast Denton.
