The friends of Emancipation Park have scheduled a Juneteenth beauty contest, a 'tour of the hood' bike ride and a talent show for children. The group hopes to raise two million dollars to make improvements to the park and make it a historical destination.
"My goal is for Houstonians to appreciate this park. We want to restore this park," Dorris Ellis Robinson, President of Friends of Emancipation Park, explained. "We want to make it a destination place so that the citizens of this city would use the park and when other people come they will come to look at a piece of Houston's history."
Pastor Jack Yates, Pastor Elias Dibble and Richard Allen, all former slaves, raised $800 to buy the 10 acres that became Emancipation Park in July 1872, only a few years after the Emancipation Proclamation was signed.
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