![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/community-members-and-elected-officials-want-a-memorial-and-educational-center-at-the-site.png\")
Community members and elected officials want a memorial and educational center at the site.Mack Rosenberg<\/p>\nNEW YORK (1010 WINS) — At first glance it may seem like just another vacant lot in New York City. But this patch of land in Elmhurst, Queens, hold a deep history: It\u2019s the site of a burial ground where hundreds of formerly enslaved people built one of the city\u2019s first Black neighborhoods, Newtown.<\/p>\n
Advocates are urging the City to step in and preserve the land to honor those resting here and to educate future generations about their stories.<\/p>\n
In total, about 300 Newtown residents are buried at the site. The plot of land has had several owners over the years, and the burial ground was eventually paved over.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Black men and women buried here were born slaves but died free,\u201d said Queens Borough President Donovan Richards on Friday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey achieved their freedom in their earthly life, but in death their memories have been shackled underground by time and forgotten by those who came after them.\u201d<\/p>\n
The borough president said the City should acquire the site immediately. \u201cCondos shouldn’t rest on my ancestors,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Kimberly Detherage, the reverend for St. Mark African Methodist Episcopal Church, which oversees the land but doesn\u2019t own it, said the people buried here helped build the city.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey made Newtown, they were a community,\u201d Detherage said. \u201cIt ignited us as a church to learn more about our history, to learn more about the people that were buried and the contributions that they made.\u201d<\/p>\n
She and other community members and elected officials want a memorial and educational center at the site.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEW YORK (1010 WINS) — At first glance it may seem like just another vacant lot in New…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":350613,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[35603,22987,9,24,63,122,134,136,135],"class_list":["post-350612","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-staten-island","tag-black-history","tag-elmhurst","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-staten-island","tag-staten-island-headlines","tag-staten-island-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=350612"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350612\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/350613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=350612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=350612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=350612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}