What looks like an ordinary neighborhood park in Jacksonville’s Durkeeville community is now confirmed to be anything but. Researchers working with the City of Jacksonville say roughly 1,200 people are buried beneath what is today Emmett Reed Park and the Emmett Reed Community Center. The new tally, released this week, more than doubles earlier estimates and is pushing city officials toward a formal, on-the-ground survey of the historic cemetery below. For many residents, the number is a stark reminder of how mid-20th-century urban renewal projects and highway construction wiped out visible traces of a long-standing Black neighborhood.
Researchers confirm a much larger burial ground
According to News4JAX, the research team working with the city has verified an updated count of about 1,200 burials on the land now occupied by Emmett Reed Park. Early records suggested somewhere between 100 and 200 graves, and later work bumped that figure to roughly 600. The new estimate, based on expanded research and analysis, doubles even that higher number. Urban planner Ennis Davis is part of the team, and city officials say a consultant will be hired to conduct a field survey that builds on radar data already collected.
From Black cemetery to community center
Mount Herman began in the 1880s as one of Jacksonville’s first large burial grounds for Black families and Black soldiers, and late 19th-century maps show the cemetery was established before the Durkeeville neighborhood formed around it. Historic research and local reporting describe how heirs of founder Francis F. L’Engle deeded the property to the city in 1941, with a condition that it must be used either as a cemetery or as a park. Emmett Reed Park and its community center were constructed on the site in the 1960s, turning a burial ground into a recreation hub. Surviving remnants of that earlier era, including the Fagin family plot and a lone headstone set into a nearby sidewalk, are documented by Modern Cities.
State grant to fund ground-penetrating radar
The city plans to tap state grant money from Florida’s Abandoned African-American Cemetery program to conduct ground-penetrating radar scans and related technical work. The Division of Historical Resources oversees that grant program and provides guidance on how to research and protect forgotten burial sites. Florida’s Division of Historical Resources outlines the program’s goals and application cycles. Local reporting indicates the funding is expected to arrive this fall, and a consultant-led radar survey must be wrapped up by 2027. The results are expected to guide how the city designs and places future memorials at the park.
Memorial plans and neighborhood voices
The city’s Durkeeville Revitalization Study directly calls for ground-penetrating radar to identify unmarked graves and for new memorial signage to share Mount Herman’s story as part of a larger neighborhood plan. Community advocates and researchers have been clear that they want public meetings, careful archaeological work, and decisions shaped by descendants and longtime residents rather than top-down plans. For more reporting on local reaction and the community’s history, see Jax Today and the city plan.
Deed restrictions and obligations
Because the L’Engle heirs’ 1941 deed includes conditional language that the land must be used as a cemetery or a park, preservation advocates argue that there are both legal and ethical responsibilities in play as the city moves forward with fieldwork and memorial design. The state grant program sets out research standards and compliance rules that will shape how any survey and follow-up projects unfold. Historical analysis and the deed language are summarized in local research and reporting by Modern Cities and in local planning documents.
What comes next for Durkeeville
Advocates note that the rediscovery of Mount Herman is part of a broader pattern of erased Black burial sites being identified across Florida and around the country. Groups that track abandoned cemeteries say the findings in Durkeeville line up with statewide preservation efforts that are only now catching up with decades of neglect. City planners and the research team say the upcoming radar work and consultant studies will shape how the site is memorialized while still honoring Emmett Reed Park’s long-standing role as a neighborhood gathering space, in line with the Durkeeville plan.
