09-04-2025
New York City plans to preserve African burial ground in Harlem
NEW YORK (PIX11) — A bus depot built in 1947 on East 126th Street, believed to be one of the original burial grounds of enslaved and free Africans, might turn into a physical historic site.
That's the idea behind the Harlem African Burial Ground initiative.
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Many people who walk, drive by, or even live in this community near East 126th Street between 1st and 2nd Avenues may not even know about the history behind this now vacant building, but the Harlem African Burial Ground initiative is looking to change that.
'I think there is a lot of important history in Harlem that sometimes has tried to be repressed or forgotten, and we think through this project, we are really going to show the contributions of free and enslaved Africans at this site,' said Saradine Pierre, Senior Project Manager, NYCEDC.
In 2015, archaeologists commissioned by the New York City Economic Development Corporation uncovered over 140 human remains fragments at this location. Remains that are believed to be of African descent.
'That sort of us helped us to prove the burial ground at that site,' added Pierre.
On Monday evening, community members and leaders of this project gathered at the City College Spitzer School of Architecture to come up with ideas on how to make this sacred be memorialized to honor those who were buried here.
'We need to do all that we can to make sure that the burial ground is treated with the deserves that it deserves,' said Marta Gutman, Dean of the Spitzer School of Architecture at the City College of New York.
'To have elders in the community, designers and architects, and then our next generation deciding the future of this site as a living space, that's the goal,' added Jerome Haferd, assistant Professor of Architecture at City College's Spitzer School of Architecture.
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For Harlem-born and raised Ayana Ricco, this will be a central place not only for Harlem's history but for New York City and the country.
'It is to inform us that we had significance from way back when, bringing forward a community that we forgot about,' said Ricco.
No timeline just yet as to when construction will begin, but they are expecting to be within the next 5 years. Rodney Leon designed the African Burial Ground Memorial in Lower Manhattan, which was completed in 2007.
'Now we have a deeper connection with the Harlem African burial ground that the world can now understand information related to the formerly enslaved people buried here,' said Leon.
'This is a reminder to continue multigeneration conversations in each of our families,' Sylvia White, who also lives in Harlem.
The leadership behind this project is asking Harlem community members to be involved with the future phases of this project, which is in its early stages.
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