Turning the unknown into 'Once Known' (2024)

NEWBURYPORT — A group of about 75 people gathered at the Old Hill Burying Ground on Tuesday afternoon to mark the location of 18 unmarked graves by lowering small “Once Known” granite markers into the ground above them.

The move was made as part of the city’s best attempt to rectify a historic slight to some of the city’s late Black residents, according to Black History Initiative member Geordie Vining.

“To us, ‘Once Known’ has a bit of an underlying connotation that perhaps their names were never known,” Vining told the crowd. “But that, of course is not true. They’re only unknown to us.”

The city’s Black History Initiative is dedicated to shining a light on a Black history in Newburyport that has been largely overlooked or forgotten, according to Vining.

Vining, who also works in the city’s planning department, said a Black neighborhood known as “Guinea Village” once stood near the corner oft Auburn and Low streets (where the Henry Graff Jr. Memorial Skating Rink now stands) in the late 1700s and early 1800s.

Many of those residents, according to Vining, were typically buried in a nearby Black section of the Old Hill Burying Ground.

In June, local historian Ghlee Woodworth noticed a grouping of unmarked gravestones in that section of the 18th century cemetery and the Black History Initiative brought in Sterling-based mapping company Geosearch Inc. to use ground-penetrating radar to survey the area.

A total of 18 gravesites were found in minutes and Woodworth said last week that she believes most of them were probably Black.

The city outlined the newly discovered graves with temporary pink and white flagging last year and the Black History Initiative had 18 8-inch-by-8-inch granite markings made with the words “Once Known” etched into them to permanently mark the site.

A bronze plaque acknowledging the Black American section of the cemetery was also installed last week.

Woodworth was joined by Vining, First Religious Society, Unitarian Universalist Church leader the Rev. Rebecca Bryan and state Rep. Rep. Dawne Shand, D-Newburyport, for the installation of the “Once Known” markers.

Vining said the “Once Known” term can be used to identify people whose names have not been recorded by history.

“Across the country, many, many historic Black burial grounds have literally been erased from the landscape,” he said. “Whether it was through indifference or neglect from local governments, or deliberate forgetting, there are a lot of these sites that are now underneath golf courses and parking lots.”

During Tuesday’s ceremony, Bryan pointed out that of the city’s 19,020 residents, only 107 are Black, a percentage she said isn’t easy to accept.

“There are so many acts and steps that we can do to make this a welcoming place,” she said. “A place where everyone is known and seen.”

Bryan, however, went on to suggest people think about all the different people who live in the city and to stop referring to Newburyport as a white community.

“Every time we say that, we’re erasing not only the people who have died who are not white people, but the people that are here today and all of their diversity,” she said.

Bryan gave a blessing as those in attendance headed up the small slope where the “Once Known” granite markings waited for them.

They then picked them up together and slowly dropped them into the holes in the ground that were dug for them.

Woodworth told people about her efforts to find unmarked graves throughout the city and said she could just “feel it” that people were quietly buried on the western side of the Old Hill Burying Ground.

She then drew the crowd’s attention to the nearby marked graves of a number of people, including a man and “faithful servant” named Fortune, a woman named Susan Cogswell and a Union Street barbershop owner, John C.H. Young, who all passed away in the 1800s and suggested the people who were buried in the 18 unmarked graves may have been their relatives.

“Is it possible their family members are buried around them? Yes,” she said.

Shand read from the poem, “The African Burial Ground” by Yusef Komunyakaa, during the ceremony and told The Daily News after that she was very moved by the event.

“It was really an awestruck moment. Just to know about who lived here and who built this city and to know that we’re remembering them today,” she said.

Shand grew up in Selma, Alabama, and was part of the first generation of students to attend integrated public schools in her hometown.

She said she was glad to see Newburyport is willing to grapple with the complicated issue of race head on.

“It’s amazing that we’re living in a community that is willing to do this,” she said.

Vining, in an earlier interview, said the project cost roughly $7,700 with $5,250 of the price tag paid with funds donated by the First Religious Society, Unitarian Universalist Church, the Newburyport Lions Club as well as a number of individual donors. The remaining $2,450 came from the city’s Community Preservation Act funds, which matches state funding with a local 2% property tax surcharge.

Expenses included $1,450 for the ground-penetrating radar work, $2,250 for the plaque and $4,000 for the “Once Known” markers, according to Vining.

Ward 2 City Councilor Jenny Donahue, School Committee member Sarah Hall and former Mayor Donna Holaday were also on hand for the installation ceremony.

Staff writer Jim Sullivan covers Newburyport for The Daily News. He can be reached via email at jsullivan@newburyportnews.com or by phone at 978-961-3145. Follow him on Twitter @ndnsully.

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