For the past 15 months, Fermata and Ted Lee Eubanks have been working on an interpretive plan for Austin’s historic squares and Congress Avenue. Finally, the report has been released! We thank the Downtown Austin Alliance for their willingness to support this effort, and for all of the stakeholders and supporters who helped us through this effort to uncover Austin’s lost histories and to return them to their rightful place in the eye of the public.
Ted Lee Eubanks, Fermata’s founder and president, is one of two certified interpretive planners in Austin, and Fermata is the only certified interpretive planning firm available for these projects in Austin and the surrounding region.
We are making the full report available as a PDF here, so enjoy getting to know the real Austin! For those only interested in reading the executive summary, that document is also available here.
Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable… Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals. Martin Luther King, Jr.
The Rev. Jacob Fontaine (1808 – 1898) lived his first 55 years as a slave. For a time, he and his wife lived on the Woodlawn Plantation, part of which is now Pease Park. With emancipation, the Rev. Fontaine became one of Austin’s most notable residents.
From this building on San Gabriel at West 24th, he operated a number of businesses, including The Gold Dollar, one of the state’s first black newspapers. Black newspapers such as The Gold Dollar served a number of purposes. Newspapers help freed slaves learn to read, keep up with current news that concerned them, and contact family members that were alienated by slavery.
For example, Rev. Fontaine place the following ad in the first edition of The Gold Dollar:
Aney one wishing to inquire for thir kinn send ten cents to the gold dollar…J. Fontaine.
This building is one of the few structures left from Wheatville, one of Austin’s freedom towns that arose after the Civil War. Wheatville corresponded to present-day West 24th Street to the south, West 26th Street to the north, Shoal Creek to the west, and Rio Grande Street to the east. In other words, Wheatville was wholly contained within the Shoal Creek watershed.
Rev. Fontaine and his family lived in the building from 1875 to 1898. Currently, the building is a bar and smokehouse, Freedmen’s Bar. The chandelier over its front bar was reportedly a part of the historic Pease Mansion, where Fontaine’s wife kept house during the 1870’s.
The University of Texas and its students have subsumed virtually all of Wheatville, an irony I assume would not be lost on the Rev. Fontaine. He tirelessly campaigned among African-Americans in Texas to support the establishment of a state university in Austin, a university that would not completely desegregate until after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
The Austin History Center (AHC) occupies the 1933 Austin public library building overlooking Wooldridge Square. The library moved next door to the John Henry Faulk building in 1979, and freed the space for the AHC. All of this I know. This is common knowledge.
But, what came before? What happened during that century between Austin’s founding and the construction of this building? What isn’t commonly known? What past hides behind the facade of the present?
Edwin Waller set aside this block for churches in the original 1839 plan for Austin. The AHC has a reference to three churches on this site but little else. The AHC website says that “the land on which our building now stands was originally designated for church use and three churches once stood on this lot.” But, which churches? What were their names? Who were the members?
My search started with Augustus Koch’s 1887 Bird’s-eye View Map of Austin. The map shows three churches in this block, and two are named in the legend: Metropolitan A. M. E. Church (#28), First Baptist (col’d) Church (#40).
Wooldridge Square 1887
The Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church was established in 1870 at the corner of San Antonio and West 9th, Lot 1, in Block 101. The first pastor of the church was Minister Frank Green. The church, still in existence, is now located at 1101 East 10th Street. Metropolitan is one of the oldest AME churches in Texas, and AME is the oldest independent Protestant denomination founded by black people in the world.
Paul Quinn College, currently in Dallas, was established at the same location by Metropolitan AME in 1872. The college would move to Waco, then to Dallas, from its origins in Austin. The college was called the Connectional High School and Institute at its founding. The school’s original purpose was to educate freedmen and their children. Paul Quinn College is the oldest historically black college west of the Mississippi River.
The second church, the First Baptist Church (col’d), was located at the corner of West 9th at Guadalupe (the other end of the block from Metropolitan). Austin deeded the land to First Baptist in 1869. The First Baptist Church still exists in East Austin and is located at 4805 Heflin Lane.
Rev. Jacob Fontaine
This church was organized by one of Austin’s earliest and most renowned African-Americans, Rev. Jacob Fontaine. According to The Handbook of Texas, “the Fontaine family lived on the Woodlawn plantation near the Austin home of ex-governor Elisha M. Pease. Jacob’s wife Melvina (Viney) was a housekeeper there and had cooked at the Governor’s Mansion….” The Woodlawn Plantation, is now, in part, Pease Park.
Rev. Fontaine established the first African-American newspaper in Austin, the Austin Gold Dollar, and helped organize the Sweet Home Missionary Baptist Church in Clarksville in 1877.
Wooldridge Square and the surrounding blocks attracted other religions, as well. One of the first synagogues in Austin began in September 1876 when a group of Austin Jews met in the mayor’s office to organize Congregation Beth Israel. Chartered by the State of Texas in 1879, the congregation built its first house of worship in 1884 on the corner of West 11th and San Jacinto. Henry Hirschfeld was elected its first president. The Hirshfield Home and Cottage, now the property of Texas A&M University, is directly southeast of Wooldridge Square on West 9th.
History that is unspoken is history that is forgotten. History is erased through acts of omission as well as commission. Inadvertent or purposeful, history that is lost is soon replaced with a new narrative, a new meaning, for our place on this planet.
Interpretation strives to resurrect these lost histories and return them to the public domain where they can bediscussedandexaminedfreelyby thegeneralpublic. Why? Freeman Tilden, quoting an anonymous U.S. National Park Service ranger a half century ago in Interpreting Our Heritage, offered one of the most compelling explanations:
Through interpretation, understanding; through understanding, appreciation; through appreciation, protection.
William Barton settled near a springs west of the mouth of Shoal Creek in the 1830’s. He left a canoe on the north bank of the Colorado River so that people in the new settlement of Austin could visit his namesake. Barton’s canoe remained the only transportation across the river until the establishment of ferries in the late 1840s.
John J. Grumbles set up a regular ferry at Shoal Creek, at the western edge of the city, where William Barton kept his canoe. Shoal Creek remained one of the most important river crossings until the construction of permanent bridges.
Narrative is the way in which we understand our world and our place in it. Yet, the stories that comprise narrative are mutable and dynamic. We build our narratives with bricks that are still wet and easily shaped.
Over time and space, stories evolve. Eventually, an evolved story will become a new species, a social construct bearing little resemblance to the actual event or action it purportedly describes.
Narratives typically contain a rich and varied array of stories and ideas; however, at any given time, a certain set of stories (and memories) tends to dominate. In other words, there is a dominant narrative that society, in general, follows.
The interpreter’s responsibility is to offer a narrative that extends outside the bounds of that which is in vogue. In other words, the interpreter’s task is to challenge the public to consider interpretations that extend beyond those in current use. The interpreter’s job is to reveal what is hidden under the veneer of convention.
The interpreter’s job is to reveal what is hidden under the veneer of convention.
Stories convey something about what we believe to be stable in the world. Yet, contrast the image above to what we know of Billy Barton’s Austin in the 1830’s. In dynamic cities such as Austin, nothing could be less stable than the community. The median age of an Austin resident is 31. Half of Austin’s citizens were born outside of Texas; 20% were born outside of the United States.
Austin City Plan 1928
Austin as a society is as unstable as its landscape. In this unstable and rapidly evolving environment, history unspoken or unrecognized is history quickly forgotten. The prevailing narrative becomes increasingly incomplete.
Here is one example. Austin is a city divided. Most of the minority community (African-American, Latino) lives east of Interstate 35. The reason is rooted in forgotten history. The 1928 Austin City Plan recommended the creation of a “negro district” east of East Avenue (now I-35). According to the engineers (Koch and Fowler) who developed this city plan;
In our studies in Austin we have found that the negroes are present in small numbers, in practically all sections of the city, excepting the area just east of East Avenue and south of the City Cemetery. This area seems to be all negro population. It is our recommendation that the nearest approach to the solution of the race segregation problem will be the recommendation of this district as a negro district, and that all the facilities and conveniences be provided the negroes in this district, as an incentive to draw the negro population to this area.
And, it worked. Most of Austin’s Latino and African-American population settled in East Austin, and has remained there ever since. With the city’s explosive growth, however, developers have discovered that East Austin is ripe for gentrification. East Austin is being redeveloped at breakneck speed, and many long-time residents are fighting a wave of gentrification that is crashing over their neighborhoods. Many see this as another instance of displacement at the hands of the descendants of those who displaced them in the 1920s.
What if no one is aware of the 1928 City Plan, or the decades of battles that were fought by Latino and African-American communities to gain their civil rights? What if no one has heard of Sweatt v Painter, or the battle over the Crosstown Expressway, or the conflict over renaming West 19th after Martin Luther King? All of this happened before most Austinites were born.
Unless this history is shared by the community, for the community, how will anyone know? The inevitable result of this gentrification is a community that feels under attack, developers that are increasingly impatient with the city, and a city government that is perplexed and ill-equipped to offer solutions.
The inevitable result of gentrification is a community that feels under attack, developers that are increasingly impatient with the city, and a city government that is perplexed and ill-equipped to offer solutions.
History that is unspoken is history that is forgotten. When history is untold, a fiction moves in to fill the void. And, this “new” history, as expressed through stories and memories, shapes actions. History informs the future, even when its incorrect or misshapen.
One solution to this problem is to have interpreted history, in all of its permutations, accessible to the people. The cloistering of history within a museum or university warehouse isn’t enough. History cannot be the exclusive domain of academicians and the local historical society.
Civic spaces such as historical squares are ideal places for introducing the public to the history that shapes the present and influences the future. Civic spaces are common grounds, places where the community can come together to better understand, appreciate, and celebrate a shared heritage. Travelers learn about the soul of the community when visiting these spaces.
Fermata is working with the Downtown Austin Alliance, in partnership with the Austin Parks and Recreation Department, to develop interpretive strategies for the three remaining public squares: Brush, Republic, and Wooldridge. These squares, part of Edwin Waller’s 1839 plan for Austin, are Austin’s original civic spaces.
We believe that history must be part of our everyday lives. History is as much about now as it is about then. Historical narrative is a way in which we understand our world and our place in it. Without that narrative, we are lost.
Bullock Texas State History Museum by Ted Lee Eubanks
The man for whom history is bunk is almost invariably as obtuse to the future as he is blind to the past…J. Frank Dobie
Austin began with Shoal Creek sitting on the sidelines. Edwin Waller adopted Shoal Creek as the western edge of the new city, and his to-be namesake as the eastern boundary. Congress Avenue became the centerline.
No longer. Austin is upside down, inside out. The city sprawls past these edges into the white-rocked and cedar-treed hinterlands. Shoal Creek neighborhoods like Old Enfield and Pemberton Heights, renewed and revitalized, eject thousands of motorists each morning to wend their ways to downtown employment.
Yet Shoal Creek pumps life in more than one direction. Shoal Creek people connect to the city through the creek, but the life of the city flows north as well. One can peer north from the mouth of Shoal Creek to the central business district, state government, the University of Texas, the Pickle Research Campus, and out to the Domain. Once an extremity, Shoal Creek is now a vital organ.
Shoal Creek is not alone in its transformation. The Colorado River, now Lady Bird Lake, and Waller Creek are evolving as well. Shoal Creek is the only one of the three to retain enough of its original form and character, however, to serve as the standard bearer for the city’s heritage.
Heritage is a squishy word, easy to mold, easy to tape to the refrigerator door. There is an element of heritage in art, in food, in architecture. Eeyore’s birthday is heritage. Wooldridge Square is heritage. Rosewood is heritage. The 1887 West 6th Street Bridge is heritage. The Bullock Texas State History Museum houses some of Austin’s heritage. SXSW is becoming heritage.
Mouth of Shoal Creek by Ted Lee Eubanks
Heritage is more than history, though. Heritage is patrimony. Heritage is legacy. Heritage is birthright. Heritage is that which previous generations left behind, consciously or unconsciously, that gives meaning to the places we live, as well as to how we live.
America is a new country, and Austin is a new city. Institutions and traditions that are well established in many of America’s older cities are either absent or in their nascence here. For example, the tradition of investing in the city through philanthropy is a new-born in Austin.
Consider Chicago, another one of America’s post-colonial metropolises. Our two cities are similar in age. Chicago was founded in 1833, and Austin in 1839. Our trajectories quickly diverged. Austin grew to 34,876 inhabitants by 1920. In the same period of time Chicago exploded to nearly 3 million (2,701,705). According to the Texas State Historical Association, “in 1905 Austin had few sanitary sewers, virtually no public parks or playgrounds, and only one paved street.” Only four years later (1909), Chicago would adopt the Burnham Plan, setting the stage for “new and widened streets, parks, new railroad and harbor facilities, and civic buildings.”
While Chicago raced forward at breakneck speed, Austin idled. While cities such as Chicago, New York, and Philadelphia were investing in great buildings and great spaces (Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia, one of the nation’s first urban renewal projects, began in 1907), Austin remained hard-scrabbled. The election to finally settle the establishment of Austin as the state capital did not take place until 1872, 30 years after the founding of the city for that expressed purpose. The new University of Texas did not hold its first classes until 1883, and the Texas state government did not occupy the new capitol building until 1888.
Austin’s “great leap forward,” ironically, is the Great Depression. Austin is the city built by the New Deal. Initiatives such as the CCC, PWA, and WPA funded many of Austin’s icons. Zilker Park, Deep Eddy, the Lamar Bridge over Lady Bird Lake, the dams on the Colorado River, including Tom Miller, Lamar Boulevard, many of the bridges over Waller and Shoal creeks, House Park, the UT Tower and Hogg Auditorium, Emma Long Metropolitan Park; all were federal relief and stimulus projects brought to Texas by strong local officials such as Mayor Tom Miller and powerful Texas congressional leaders such as John Nance Garner, Lyndon Johnson, and James P. “Buck” Buchanan. These projects did not come from a generous philanthropic community. Much of this infrastructure came from the beneficent federal government.
Even in 1964, the year the nation elected sometimes Austinite Lyndon Johnson president by landslide, Austin’s population had only grown to a little over 200,000. By 1964, Austin had a growth rate of 1.5% and a population 1% of Chicago’s.
Within 50 years, however, the pattern had dramatically changed. The Armadillo World Headquarters had set the stage for Dell Computers. By 2013, Austin topped 875,000, and Chicago hemorrhaged population (in fact, Chicago is smaller today than in 1920). One of the great cities of the twentieth century, Chicago, is moving aside for Austin, a city from the twenty-first.
West 3rd RR Trestle by Ted Lee Eubanks
Chicago shaped its future and its legacy in 1909 with the Burnham Plan. The Burnham Plan carried Chicago for a century. Austin has yet to choose. We have no vision, no plan, and whatever legacy we are leaving is being written for us by outside consultants. A city of emigrants is a city without its own past, its own heritage. We have chosen to import one instead.
I suspect that one of the visions being imported is from Chicago. Some of those leaving Chicago come here. They bring their tastes and cultures with them. With every arrival Austin changes ever so slightly from what it has been to what it may be. Some who come are here to earn the most and to invest the least. Yet there are others for whom Austin is now home, not only a destination but a destiny as well.
Yet consider the possibilities. Austin isn’t hamstrung with preconceptions of what a city should or should not be. Austin can draw upon its native traditions, as well as those of the people who have chosen to emigrate here. This amalgamation may well combine into an entirely novel heritage that guides (and profits) future generations of Austinites. Austin is poised to become one of the great twenty-first century American cities. much like twentieth century Chicago and nineteenth century Philadelphia.
At these crucial moments great cities find the will to trap opportunity and harness it for the betterment of all. Shoal Creek offers the opportunity for us to show how this should be done. These opportunities demand grand plans to accompany grand aspirations. Grand plans dance between the impositions of the past and the insensitivities of the future. At this moment, Austin has no grand plans, no path to walk. Yet the opportunity for greatness remains, waiting on an inspired few to stir men’s blood.
Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men’s blood…Daniel Burnham
