DUBLIN, Ohio (WSYX) — It’s the resting place of her great-great-grandmother, but Anita Howard-Dixon said protecting the Dublin cemetery is about more than that — she calls it “justice.”
The city of Dublin on Friday opened a cemetery where more than 20 black Ohioans are buried.
Mary Brown, a relative of Howard Dixon, was a freed slave who settled in Dublin in the 1830s. She and her husband owned land near what is now the Shire Rings Road.
In 2020, the cemetery where Brown is buried was discovered during a land survey for the new Wexner Medical Center, and Dublin authorities subsequently discovered a connection between the Brown family and the Harris family.
Family members from both sides were in attendance on Friday.
“Our family is so grateful,” Howard Dixon said.
“This is history that, like so much of the history of Black people in Ohio and much of the U.S., could have been lost forever,” said Diamond Crowder, who focuses on underrepresented communities at the Ohio Historical Society.
“When we look at African-American history, the history, the places, the stories and the experiences have been largely erased,” Crowder said.
“A lot of people got separated during slavery and lost their roots that they could trace back to, so it’s always nice to be able to connect with our ancestors because we come from them,” Howard-Dixon said.
“It’s a kind of justice to acknowledge the historic impact we’ve had on the city of Dublin and this country,” she said. “For something like this to happen, I think it speaks to the direction we’re heading as a country.”
