The Katy News
On February 27, 1886, Fort Bend County’s trailblazing Benjamin Franklin Williams – a former slave-turned State Representative, the very first Black legislator in Texas history, one of 10 Black constitutional delegates during Reconstruction, and one of the forefathers of Kendleton – passed away. On this same day 136 years later, Fort Bend County’s Commissioner Dexter L. McCoy took to the stage, steps away from Williams’s resting place, and announced a landmark $4 million investment into the very same community Williams helped establish.
Kendleton, one of the very first freedmen’s communities established after Emancipation, is home to a breadth of important, yet underrecognized Texas history. Williams aside, the town’s descendants also include Barbara Jordan, the legendary Houston Congresswoman whose father preached to the community, as well as Walter Moses Burton, the first African-American Sheriff in Fort Bend County history. “This memorial will commemorate the Black experience, not only in Fort Bend County, but in Texas, and really be reflective of the stories from Kendleton all the way to Congress and beyond.”
Commissioner McCoy was joined by a bipartisan medley of local officials, reflecting the apolitical, unifying nature of this solemn project. He was joined on-stage by Former Congressman Pete Olson, Architect Gregory Hines, and Kendleton Mayor Darryl K. Humphrey, Sr. Other elected officials in attendance included Sheriff Eric Fagan, Treasurer Bill Rickert, District Attorney Brian Middleton, County Attorney Bridgette Smith-Lawson, and Constable Mike Beard, among others. Also present were representatives of Congresswoman Lizzie Fletcher, County Judge K.P. George, and Commissioners Andy Meyers and Grady Prestage.
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