Quakertown was an African-American settlement in Denton, Tx. from the 1880s to the 1920s, a town-within-a-township built upon Booker T. Washingtons philosophy of self-reliance and black entrepreneurship. The residents were removed by the Denton government to make room for Civic Center Park (now Quakertown Park). Quakertown was originally a settlement of African-Americans in Denton, named after the Quakers who had helped in the Underground Railroad. When Texas Womans University was built in close proximity, there was an election over whether or not to build a park in the location of Quakertown. The election was won in favor of the park, and the African-American residents were forced to leave. The people of Quakertown were the sons and daughters of freed slaves who settled in an area they called “Freedman Town” in 1875. Freedman Town was located in the south east side of the modern day city of Denton. These settlers consisted of newly freed slaves who purchased land in Freedman Town and started raising families. As the population grew, the next generation began to spread northward, eventually forming Quakertown, an all black neighborhood named for the Pennsylvania Quakers abolitionists that helped their parents a generation before. By the early 1900s, Quakertown extended from the recently established College of Industrial Arts (CIA), known today as Texas Womans University, south to McKinney Street and from Bell Avenue to Oakland Avenue in the center of Denton. Joe and Alice Skinner in Quakertown, c. 1913
Posted on: Tue, 25 Mar 2014 22:05:10 +0000
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