Nearly 120 years since the last known burial, a zoo expansion project highlights the old cemetery as modernity brushes against the quiet, wooded, and primarily forgotten burial ground of more than 4,700 people.
Liza Montgomery was just 19 when she died of tuberculosis in 1888. Born just four years after the end of the Civil War, the young Black woman is buried on the grounds of what is now the Birmingham Zoo.
“Those who win take advantage of the land and are the ones who are able to use the power they have to get things done,” said Fallin, whose areas of study include African American history and the history of the U.S. South. “And those who are poor are the ones who get taken advantage of. That’s a fact of history.”
Montgomery was buried there on July 19, 1888. The same day, another girl, Mattie Wood was also laid to rest. Mattie was just 3 years old. Her cause of death is listed as unknown. “With the majority of this, nobody knows who is where,” said Chris Pfefferkorn, president and CEO of the Birmingham Zoo. “But we still want to treat the people with the respect they deserve in this process. What we would like to do is not only add the marker, but we would like to add graphics and interpretative information about the history of Lane Park and the zoo because there’s a lot of history.
The cemetery’s presence on the grounds of the zoo is well documented. According to a 1964 article in the Birmingham Post Herald newspaper, workers creating a rose garden at the nearby Botanical Gardens uncovered at least three graves.
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