PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — A popular South Philadelphia playground will be redesigned and renovated, to honor the legacy of thousands of people discovered to be buried beneath it.
Singers from Mother Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church opened Saturday’s unveiling ceremony of the Bethel Burying Ground Public Art Memorial redesign at South Philadelphia’s Weccacoe Playground.
More than a decade ago, activists discovered that the playground, at 400 Catherine Street, was built on the church’s former burial site. They notified the city, then headed by the Nutter administration.
Rev. Mark Kelly Tyler, Mother Bethel’s pastor, says board members in 1889 were forced to sell their burial ground to the city because they couldn’t afford to keep this land in addition to their church.
“Why is it that Black workers who had thousands of members in their church couldn't afford to do both? Well, there was a big wage disparity between Black and white workers in Philadelphia at that time, some may say even to this day,” he said.
Mayor Jim Kenney was a City Councilmember when the cemetery was discovered beneath the playground. “I don't want to know how they even built a recreation center off on top of this holy site, this sacred site,” he mused, “and I think it's appropriate that we acknowledge it and we make it a sacred place again.”
The new construction plan will highlight that history, according to designer Karen Olivier. “We don't know much about many of the people who lived here, so it's going to be a fragmented biography that's going to give maybe a little bit of information about who they were, how they lived, maybe their circumstances,” she explained.
As for how the renovated playground will look, “There will be granite white pavers with inscriptions [with biographies of] some of those who are buried here,” she described.
Kenney says the location will continue to serve the community as a playground in a way that allows them to connect with its history as a burial ground. “Our African American history has been denied in this country and in the city for far too long,” he said. “I think it's important for these kids to know who some of these folks were.”
Work on the memorial will begin next spring, after all permits are submitted and approved.