Another fine article by Frances James
By Frances James (1922 – 2019)
The address for the Oak Cliff Cemetery also known as the Beaty Cemetery is 1300 East Eighth Street in Oak Cliff. The first ten acre portion of the Beaty Cemetery is on land donated by William S. Beaty for a burial place where he had buried his younger brother, Josiah (1817-18??).
William S. Beaty (1812-1847) left Scott County, Kentucky, where his family had moved after the Revolutionary War, in 1836 and came to the Republic of Texas. Beaty received a Class Two Headright certificate on April 25, 1838 from the Harrisburg (Houston) Board of Land Commissioners for 640 acres of land “to be surveyed after the first day of August, 1838.” Later, September 7, 1841, this grant was confirmed by the Republic of Texas Certificate No. 109 issued in Austin. Beaty’s Survey was completed by David K. Webb, surveyor of Robertson County on January1, 1842.
On June 5, 1846, William S. Beaty deeded “ten acres more or less” of his original 640 acres to be used for burial purposes for the new settlement west of the Trinity. The date of his brother Josiah’s death is not known, but the deed states that “in consideration of the good will I bear the settlement hereafter mentioned and also in order that the buried remains of my beloved brother may not be disturbed or the land in which he lies be ploughed” the ten acres were given over to trustees of the burial ground “subject to no one sect but shall remain open to all.” Beaty himself died in February 1847. The named cemetery trustees in the deed are Samuel Sloan, Lenan and Aaron Overton, along with alternates, Robert Sloan and William H. Hord.
Note from the author: Of the many land records I have personally attempted to find and understand, this is the only one with this particular type of documentation.
The first recorded grave in this cemetery was that of Martha Wright, a baby girl, 1844. Natives of Tennessee John W. Wright twenty-four years old and his wife Sarah, fifteen years old, settled west of the Trinity in Robertson County prior to 1844. On the 1850 census they are listed as family No. 152 with two children George, four, and John, two, and both listed as born in Texas. By 1854 Sarah has died and is also buried in this cemetery.
Among the pioneers buried here is Judge William S. Hord and his wife. When the Hord’s farm was sold, the bodies were re-interred here at the Oak Cliff Cemetery in the Crawford lot. The west side of the Trinity was called Hord’s Ridge until about 1897 and was named for this family.
Mattie Miller, one of the daughters of William Brown Miller who was brought to Texas in 1847 when she was six, married Sam Frank Leonard and they lived in Oak Cliff. When she died in 1912, she was buried at Oak Cliff Cemetery.
Leslie Stemmons (1876-1939) is buried here. Due to his desire to prevent Dallas and Oak Cliff from ever being flooded again like they were in 1908, he was instrumental along with his sons in seeing that the levees were built for the Trinity River to protect the city. After his wife died in childbirth in 1910, Leslie went on a tour to view the building of the Panama Canal. He saw all that dirt moved and thought that the Trinity River could be straightened and the dirt used to build the needed levees. Stemmons brought his idea back and started working with other big business men in Dallas to get the bonds passed that would enable this protection for the city to be built. Leslie Stemmons died before the levees were completed, but his sons had grown up with the project all their lives. John Stemmons, the baby born in 1910 and raised by a black nanny, was responsible for seeing the project was completed in the 1930-1940s. Stemmons Freeway-Highway 35 through Dallas and corridor are built on land filled in after the Trinity River was moved to the west. This family is buried here.
The founder of the Skillern Drug Store chain is buried at Oak Cliff cemetery with members of his family. James A. Skillern (1856-1914) who came to Texas in 1875 received his diploma in pharmacy from Vanderbilt University ten years later. This is when he started his first drug store in Lewisville in 1885. J. A. had married Mamie Edwards in 1884. When fire damaged that first store in 1893, James sold out and moved to Sherman and started another one. Two years later, Skillern started his first store in downtown Dallas near the courthouse. The second Dallas drugstore was located near the old Interurban Building. In 1899 their daughter Zulu was born. Frank Skillern, a son, managed this store until his father’s death, then he became president of the company until his death. After the death of his brother Frank in 1922, Rae Skillern became president and it was during the next forty-three years than many new trends and designs were instigated, and a chain of drugstores was operating all around North Texas. Rae and his wife Anne Thomas Wilson Skillern were killed in a tragic automobile accident in August 1964 on their way home from a visit to their Triple R. Ranch a mile and one-half east of Lewisville.
Edward G. Eisenlohr, a well known Texas artist, died in 1961 and is buried here. His father, R. F. Eisenlohr, was buried here in 1874. R. F. owned a drug store in downtown Dallas in 1860 and it was near this building in a hot July afternoon that the fire started that destroyed most of the buildings in the small town of Dallas! G. A. Eisenlohr, an uncle, was the first weather observer in Dallas.
The next to youngest son of Sam Houston, Colonel William Rogers Houston, was buried here in 1920. Col. Houston, a special enforcement officer for the Indian Bureau of the Department of the Interior was found beside the road near Hugo, Oklahoma where he had suffered a stroke and fallen from his horse. His nephew, T. H. Morrow, whose family lived in Dallas, brought his body back to Dallas for burial. Colonel Houston was a member of the Tannehill Masonic Lodge.
Two Dallas mayors, George Sergeant (1935-1937) and George Sprague (1937-1939) are here with their families. Henry Dorsey, 1994, who built one of the first “skyscrapers” – six stories – in Dallas and his family are buried here. Dorsey was the founder of an early printing and office supply company.
Mrs. Hugh H. Perry is buried at Oak Cliff Cemetery. She was a member of Christ Episcopal Church on Tenth Street and was buried from the church November 29, 1915. This was quite the headlines that winter as Mrs. Perry, a well known worker at the church had gone to downtown Dallas shopping on November 15 with her sister and never returned home. Her body was found ten days later in a ravine in Trinity Heights and the nuts she had purchased while shopping were still in her purse. One of her ear rings had been removed and was on the ground, her diamond rings and a brooch were missing. The authorities were later convinced it was a murder not suicide.
In January 1917 Lieutenant Tom Chandler, thirty-three, was buried at the Oak Cliff Cemetery. He was one of the five firemen who were injured when the “automobile chemical truck” from the Tenth Street Station turned over in an effort to avoid striking an automobile “driven by a woman.” The other four men suffered varying injuries but recovered. The accident was near the west end of the Dallas Oak Cliff viaduct.
Many members of the Boedecker family are buried here. The Boedecker Manufacturing Company advertised that they made ice as well as ice cream in the 1924 City Directory. There was a Boedecker grocery store and meat market on S. Lancaster.
There is a large plot with a beautiful wrought iron fence around it for the Cretien family members. Athanasa and Augustine Cretien came to Texas with the La Reunion Colony in 1854. Some of the colonists returned to Europe but the Cretiens stayed in the Dallas area and their descendants have contributed to the development of America!
As stipulated in the deed donating the original ten acres for the Beaty Cemetery, a section of the ten acres was set aside for the black families who choose to be buried here. At one time there was a fence separating this area from the rest of the cemetery but this was removed many years ago.
There is an inventory of this section available. These families did not participate in the clean up days, nor take care of their individual graves. When all known were contacted to donate funds to provide for perpetual care, no one participated in that either.
Among the black families buried in this cemetery is that of Alabama native Anthony Boswell who although born a slave came to Texas as a free man having bought his freedom. He settled in the Oak Cliff area and acquired a large tract of land. He became a successful merchant as co-owner of a grocery store. Elizabeth Chapel CME Church was named for his wife Elizabeth. There are two separate plots that contain members of the Boswell family.
Other sections of particular interest that are set aside are a Potter’s Field and the Strangers Rest and the 9th Street Extension. A map has been prepared to explain all this.
In 1897, the ladies of the Oak Cliff Cemetery Association invited all to come help care for the site. They were requested to bring rakes, hoes, and if you intend to stay all day, bring your lunch. In 1899 several ladies met with the Oak Cliff Council (not annexed to Dallas until 1903) asking that the Oak Cliff Cemetery be improved and beautified.
There has been vandalism, and some of the wrought iron private fences have been stolen. Many of the head stones have been reset and leveled through the years. There have been two Texas Historical Markers at this site. The first one dedicated in 1985 was made of aluminum, as all are, and mounted on a pole. It was stolen and had to be replaced. This second one is set in concrete!
A log book has been kept up for many years and in 1993 the Dallas Genealogical Society with many volunteers were determined to inventory all of the over 2500 persons buried in the Oak Cliff Cemetery, some with and some without head stones. They used the old log book and other assorted records. The project took several years and was upgraded through March 1997. This inventory is available on line.
A Board of Trustees was established to care for the cemetery in the 1950s. Income from a trust fund that was established in 1955 provides maintenance for this cemetery. Every once in a while there will be a burial at the site even now.
James, Frances, “Dallas County History – From the Ground Up, Vol. III,” 2011.
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