League Metropolis will title a brand new roadways to commemorate one of many city’s first Black settlers.
The decision to call the not-yet-built roadway after one of many city’s first households will quickly come to fruition years after former mayor Pat Hallisey expressed curiosity within the endeavor. Councilmembers Tuesday voted unanimously in favor of the dedication, as greater than 20 descendants of Alexander Winfield gathered in chamber halls.
“It feels good to be seen and it feels good to be acknowledged,” Deborah Konrad, Alexander Winfield’s great-granddaughter stated. “League Metropolis is a giant metropolis to me proper now and we admire it a lot for correcting one thing that went as an oversight for over 100 years.”
“We look ahead to driving on Winfield Park,” she stated.
A Civil Struggle veteran, Alexander Winfield was League Metropolis’s first Buffalo Soldier, Hallisey, who spearheaded the efforts stated. In 1902, the Winfield household settled alongside Hobbs Street, the place they owned 30-50 acres, which on the time got here in round $750.
A number of Winfield relations stay alongside that very stretch of street as we speak. Winfield additionally based a church throughout his time within the space. That was Winfield Methodist Episcopal Church, which finally merged with one other congregation to grow to be the Religion United Methodist Church in Dickinson, in line with town.
Winfield’s ancestors don’t instantly know what introduced him to League Metropolis, however paperwork present Winfield was probably concerned in working cattle when he moved to Texas, in line with town.
Winfield died in 1915, when Hallisey stated components of his legacy started to fade due to social ills of the twentieth century.
Over 150 Winfield descendants gathered in League Metropolis for a household reunion, when Hallisey offered the household with a decision that acknowledged them as a founding household of League Metropolis.
And whereas descendants and residents rejoice in a giant step in direction of preserving town’s historical past, it will likely be no less than a yr earlier than they’ll take their first drive on Winfield Parkway, officers stated.
“I feel over the course of the subsequent a number of months, it’s going to get built-in items, it received’t be one main roadway throughout town all at one time however as the event comes ahead,” John Baumgartner, metropolis supervisor stated. “They’re engaged on each the east finish of it, near Touchdown Boulevard, after which on the west finish of it near Maple Leaf, and so we are going to begin seeing items come collectively…”
“After we get able to open the part, we are going to let the household know we’re doing that and perhaps do a ribbon reducing nearer to that point,” Baumgartner stated.
– Written by Sara Grunau for Houston Public Media
