With a bellowing voice and masterful piano playing, Mercy Dee Walton emerged as an early influence in rhythm and blues not only in Waco but across the country. Towering figures such as Ma Rainey and Fats Domino are rightfully remembered as foundational for the blues and later rock n’ roll, but artists with less recording opportunities, like Walton, also shaped the country’s music scene in the early twentieth century.

Walton grew up on the water. His parents, Fred and Bessie Walton, worked on a small farm on the banks of Brazos in Waco and welcomed their son on August 30, 1915. Though a young Mercy Dee Walton worked the corn and cotton fields, he found himself captivated by local music. Aspiring musicians traversed Texas, performing on stages and in homes for little to nothing. Thirteen-year-old Walton listened, soaking in soulful vocals and rhythmic instrumentals. The blues artists he heard told stories of hardship and of love to steel guitar and striking barrelhouse piano arrangements. Searching for his own voice, Walton began to play piano and sing the blues at ten-cent house parties, where locals could pay a dime to hear the young artist hone his skills.

Waco’s own musicians influenced Walton’s sound. Unrecorded artists, such as Pete the Grey Ghost and Delois Maxey, impacted his style and song. Though many blues artists of the early twentieth century never recorded albums, their artistry formed other musicians. When Walton witnessed Maxey’s piano expertise at house parties, for example, he modeled his own playing after him. Others also influenced his sound, including Waco and Marlin piano players Son Brewster and Bob Jackson. Though labels never captured their talents, their inflections remained present in the work of later blues musicians.

Audiences certainly understood the talent of these rising artists. As Walton grew in popularity, he moved from intimate venues to larger crowds in Fort Worth. In the early 1930s, he took the stage at the Dixie and Bryson Taverns. Other emerging musicians, such as Pinetop Shorty, joined him. After playing the Texas circuit, Walton decided to move westward to an up-and-coming music metropolis, Los Angeles, in the late 1930s.

While playing around Fresno, Chester Lu, an executive at a smaller recording label called Spire Company, heard Walton’s talent. Walton recorded his first song “Lonesome Cabin Blues” with Spire. Though the song rose to the top ten on R&B charts, Walton’s performances and albums did not result in financial prosperity. As he sang about his troubles on stage, they persisted in his life as he continued to labor for little pay. For instance, at one venue, Walton performed for a few dollars and a hot meal. Agricultural work provided supplemental income as Walton continued to pursue his musical career, and he often performed at bars where Black farmworkers gathered to listen to lyrics that illustrated their experiences. 

After reaching number seven on the charts with “Lonesome Cabin Blues,” Walton cut a record with Imperial Records. The songs never charted, and Walton did not record any more songs with Imperial. Things changed when Walton joined Specialty Records. He recorded his hit song “One Room Country Shack” in May 1952, and garnered national attention. He briefly toured with the popular Jay McNeely Band, whose smooth saxophone sound skyrocketed the group to the top of the Billboard charts. A long way from the Texas circuit, Walton traveled across the country, singing popular tracks, such as “Roamin’ Blues” and “Romp & Stomp Blues,” in auditoriums for large crowds. One song that captured fans’ attention was “Rent Man Blues,” which featured Walton’s wife, Thelma Walton, who received the pseudonym Lady Fox on the record.

Walton cut more records with Specialty, but none accumulated extensive recognition. Notably, payola, the practice of bribing radio hosts to play certain songs to increase an artist’s popularity and a label’s success, ran rampant throughout Walton’s career. Though he recorded with two small labels, Rhythm and Flair, in the mid-1950s, his albums did not reach previous heights on the charts. He moved to Stockton, California, where he continued agricultural work and played music on a smaller scale.

Though Walton’s recording opportunities seemed to decline over time, in 1961, record producer and blues fan Chris Strachwitz began to record with Walton on his newly founded label, Arhoolie. With his remarkable barrelhouse piano style, Walton put down multiple tracks with Strachwitz. Tragically, as his career seemed to be resurging in the recording studio, Walton died suddenly in December 1962. Though his recordings remain few, his conceptions of rhythm and blues live on, shaping artists in Waco and beyond.

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Urban renewal programs swept across the United States in the mid-twentieth century. Funded by the federal government, cities throughout the country sought to improve local architecture and expand residential areas by purchasing and decimating pre-existing neighborhoods, a process often referred to as “slum clearance.” The City of Waco conducted the largest urban renewal program in the state of Texas. Intending to redesign and improve city infrastructure, local government officials formed the Waco Urban Renewal Agency. Launched in 1957, the first project was a partnership with Baylor University and focused on the renewal of land adjacent to the school’s campus. 

In the summer of 1958, Waco and Baylor declared the homes, businesses, churches, and other buildings near the Brazos River as “slums” in need of clearance. City planner E. H. Lovelace of Harland Bartholomew & Associates, an urban planning firm, affirmed Waco’s first project location as ideal for urban renewal. The city held a vote in June for the Baylor University Project, which received a resounding vote of approval—2,133 yeas to 293 nays. Notably, the City of Waco changed voting requirements on voting day, declaring only property owners as eligible voters. Seventy percent of residents in the area deemed a slum rented their homes.

After the election, Waco and Baylor planned to construct a park, residential housing, highways, and expand Baylor’s campus in the area. Most of the homes within the approved urban renewal area belonged to Black Wacoans. Residents appeared before the city council on October 13, 1958, to protest the confiscation of their homes. The expansion of Baylor University, which still refused Black students’ entry, remained central to their objections. Eighty property owners from the area signed a petition to maintain ownership of their homes.

Waco and Baylor ignored residential complaints and moved forward with urban renewal. In January 1959, they received federal approval of $67,474 for the 85-acre project. Once the Texas Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of federal aid for local urban renewal projects, Waco and Baylor established the official bounds of their first urban renewal project: the area confined by Fourth and First Streets and Jones and Leila Avenues. Waco’s urban renewal committee members—including real estate agent Hank L. Corwin, former mayor Truett Smith, Baylor Trustee Hilton E. Howell, and Baylor Executive Vice President Abner McCall—cheered federal and state approval, declaring the decision a victory for Waco and Baylor.

The city and university planned to remove 187 homes from the area, resulting in the relocation of 209 families and 50 individuals, the majority of whom were people of color. Residents and advocates for those within the bounds of Waco’s first urban renewal project gathered to protest once more on November 24, 1959.

Overflowing into the corridors, hundreds of urban renewal protestors blocked the entrance of city hall. Church members objected to the movement of their congregational spaces. Property owners resisted the seizure of their homes. Fred Finch, a prominent NAACP lawyer, objected to the area’s classification as a “slum” and noted that many residents would never be able to purchase another home. Resident after resident objected to their relocation. Waco Reverend J. L. Carter of 1621 South Third Street also rose to protest. If removed, he declared that he would not be able to buy another home or send his four daughters to college, especially since they could not attend segregated Baylor University. “In the event that this plan should pass and all the people are moved out, I believe you will cause a number of crimes,” Carter stated, “and I am a minister.”

Despite extraordinary opposition, Waco and Baylor began to relocate residents and knock down structures in January 1960. By 1963, the Waco Urban Renewal Agency had removed all residents from the Baylor University Project area and demolished all 272 structures within its bounds.

Waco and Baylor completed the Baylor University Project, or Baylor 1A, in July 1964, the first urban renewal project completed in the state of Texas, and soon completed another project, Riverside 1 Baylor. With federal funds, Waco purchased land from local residents, often at lower rates than market value, and sold the property to the private university. Baylor eventually bought 163 acres and constructed new classroom buildings, dormitories, and faculty housing. The university’s campus, which grew by fifty acres during this time, remains on urban renewal land today.

Several additional urban renewal projects ran in Waco throughout the mid- to late twentieth century. In 1960, they began the next initiative in Calle Dos near St. Francis Catholic Church and Sandtown. Over the next ten years, Waco purchased and renewed over 2,100 acres of land. By the late 1970s, Waco had completed ten urban renewal projects, more than any other city in Texas, permanently shifting the structure of the city and the residents within its bounds.

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At the end of the Civil War, a new nation seemed to be on the horizon. Emancipation and the beginning of Reconstruction signaled a shift in national, state, and local institutions across the country. The Reconstruction Era, though certainly flawed, offered potential equality for Black and white citizens. During this period of immense change, Black men began to vote and entered positions of power previously denied to them. Formerly enslaved and freed men were elected to public office only a few years after the abolition of slavery.

In Texas, voters elected African American legislators throughout Reconstruction, including fifty-two at the state level. Comprised of farmers, businessmen, preachers, teachers, and lawyers, each of these men had different backgrounds. Though many were denied formal education by their enslavers, most were literate, and all joined the Republican, often referred to as the Radical, Party. Through their positions, they sought to improve the lives of Black people whose opportunities remained scarce after emancipation. For many, postwar freedom in Texas meant sharecropping and tenant farming for low wages, often under the supervision of former enslavers. Many Black officials during Reconstruction endeavored to address these oppressions and provide resources to those in need.

Shep Mullens, one of these Black officials in Texas, resided in Waco. Born enslaved in 1828 in Lawrence County, Alabama, Mullens’s white enslavers relocated to Texas in 1854. They eventually moved to Waco by 1860, where Mullens remained following emancipation. On August 23, 1867, he registered to vote in McLennan County. That same year, General Charles Griffin, a military leader stationed in the previously Confederate state, appointed Mullens to County Commissioner and Voter Registrar. Griffin, who worked for the Freedman’s Bureau of Texas, registered Black and white voters throughout the state, and refused to recognize public officials who had previously worked on behalf of the Confederacy.

After Mullens’s appointment in 1867, voters elected him to the Constitutional Convention of 1868-69, where he filled the seat of a deceased member who previously represented McLennan, Falls, and Bell Counties. There, he served as a member of the Public Lands, Commerce, and Manufactures Committees. Following this election, General Joseph John Reynolds, who succeeded General Griffin, again selected Mullens as County Commissioner of McLennan County. Republican Party members and local voters saw Mullens as a promising, rising politician.

In 1869, Republicans appointed Mullens to Republican Party leader of McLennan County, and voters elected him to a seat in the Texas House of Representatives. He took the oath of office for the Twelfth Legislature on February 8, 1870. That legislature included the largest number of Black senators and representatives as well as the only Republican majority in the Reconstruction and post-Reconstruction eras. During his tenure, Mullens served on the Privileges and Elections Committee as well as the Federal Relations and Immigration Committees. He also advocated for integrated, state-funded public education. Additionally, he sought to establish the Texas State Police and a militia to subdue violence, often initiated by white Americans against Black Americans, throughout the state. In 1870, the New Era, an African American newspaper, praised his efforts and declared that “[there] is no more earnest worker in the Republican ranks, and no man in his district possesses the confidence of the people to a greater extent than does Mr. Mullens.”

Mullens also worked as a blacksmith in Waco. Local tax rolls convey that he owned $1,174 worth of property, including two lots in the city. County marriage records also report that Mullens married Sallie “Agnes” Downs, a formerly enslaved woman in Texas, on December 26, 1866. Together, they had a daughter named Mary, born prior on April 22, 1858.

On August 6, 1871, Mullens passed away unexpectedly at the age of forty-two. He was buried in Waco at First Street Cemetery, and his elected positions remained unfilled as Reconstruction fell apart in Texas and throughout the country. A result of the Compromise of 1877, Reconstruction ended with an informal agreement between Southern Democrats and the Republican Party. Republicans, seeking Democratic approval of the election of President Rutherford B. Hayes, agreed to remove federal troops stationed in previous Confederate states. Though roughly two thousand Black men held positions at the local, state, and federal levels throughout Reconstruction, those numbers dramatically declined following 1877.

After the Compromise, white Americans overthrew Reconstruction-era governments, disenfranchised Black voters, and removed Black men from public office. In some states, white leaders attempted to eliminate Black politicians’ names from the historical record. As a result, little information remains about many of these men, their time in office, or their lives in general.

In Texas, following Mullens’s passing in 1871, white leaders and voters removed all Black officials from office by 1883. Not until 1966, following the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the election of Barbara Jordan, would Texas be represented by another Black American. Though some documentation remains, many of their legacies remain sparse, including that of Mullens. His story, in some ways, lost—like the Reconstruction efforts of the late nineteenth century.

Note: Different documents contain varied spellings of Shep Mullens’s name. These include Shep, Shepherd, Sheppard, or Shepart, and Mullens or Mullins.

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St. James United Methodist Church, originally a Methodist Episcopal church, has existed almost as long as the city of Waco itself. Founded in 1874 by Anderson Brack, a formerly enslaved man, the congregation started with roughly fifty-three members. On the banks of the Brazos River, they worshipped, communed together, and worked to establish a permanent brick-and-mortar building that would serve as a central location for their Christian community. Along with the church, St. James also established a school that provided education to Black children in the Waco area. As they sought to secure a steady meeting place, though, they faced difficulty and discrimination.

Built in 1889, their original building at Second and Ross Streets was the first brick church for African Americans in Waco. St. James, established after Mt. Zion, was the second African American church in the city. After the city of Waco condemned their new building, they built a larger tabernacle in 1909 in the same location. They worshipped there until 1922. That year, the San Antonio and Aransas Pass Railroad Company purchased the property, citing eminent domain, and the St. James congregation built once more. This time, on Second and Clay Avenue.

Under the leadership of Pastor C. S. Williams, the congregation broke ground on the church in March 1924. Utilizing bricks from their previous tabernacles inside the new structure, St. James memorialized and honored the history of their church. Architect Carleton Adams, who garnered statewide and national attention for his home and building designs in San Antonio, developed plans for the Tudor Gothic-style structure. While members were eager to meet in the new location, the congregation experienced financial strain in the years to come after accumulating $85,000 in debt to construct the building, which took thirty-two years to repay.

At Second and Clay, St. James committed themselves to racial justice initiatives in the community as well as interracial partnerships. During the Great Depression, they offered a daily soup kitchen to Wacoans in need. They also held meetings for the “Waco Forward” movement of the 1920s that launched as a local effort to assist those struggling amid economic stagnation. Waco Forward hoped to improve Waco’s economy and usher in an era of progress and stability. St. James also hosted other interracial events, including concerts and women’s groups, as well as a “Race Relations Sunday” service in February 1945. There, they called for attendees to “build a nation and a world where there shall be no discrimination on the basis of color, creed, or national origin.”

After its formation in 1936, the McLennan County chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) met multiple times at St. James. At an “NAACP Sunday” event in 1951, which occurred during the civil rights movement, the McLennan County chapter formed a plan that addressed local and national needs. They also hosted another notable meeting in 1955, where the organization expressed their support of the “Free by ‘63” campaign. This campaign effort raised funds for numerous legal cases taking place during the movement. Those a part of the NAACP and the church sought to address and end discrimination in Texas and across the country.

Important to Waco and St. James, multiple prominent members worked within and outside of the church. Robert L. Smith, one of the first Black Americans elected to the Texas House of Representatives in 1894, attended St. James. Prior to his arrival in Waco, Smith established the Farmers’ Improvement Society, which aided farmers who had fallen into extensive debt. Inescapable debt particularly impacted previously enslaved people who turned to sharecropping and tenant farming after emancipation. As Smith worked for these communities in Waco, he also served as a steward and legal adviser for the church. J. J. Flewellen and Professor J. S. Henry, principals at Carver High and Kirk Elementary, also attended St. James. Both schools offered educational opportunities to Black students in Waco. Lonnie Morris Belle Hodges, the church’s historian, strove to bring attention to the history of St. James. As the only living descendent of St. James’s charter members with continuing membership, Hodges worked to attain recognition for the history of the congregation and building. In 1986, the building received a Recorded Texas Historical Marker due to her efforts.

The congregation continued to grow over the years, exceeding over six hundred members during their strongest periods. Yet, by 2015, St. James had dwindled once more to fewer than sixty congregants. Deciding to focus more on fellowship and community rather than upkeep of an aging structure, they placed the historic building on the market. The church received a City of Waco Historic Landmark in 2017 and was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on September 12, 2019. St. James remains the only religious structure on the National Register of Historic Places in Waco. The building, purchased by local Wacoans Amy and Lane Murphy, remains a prominent historical landmark for the city. As they transition the church into a restaurant and event space, they plan to preserve the history of the congregation and the building. Members of St. James now meet in another location in Waco, joining with Wesley United Methodist Church each Sunday. There, they continue to commune and worship together. Through the remaining congregation and renovation efforts at Second and Clay, the long history of St. James United Methodist Church persists in Waco.

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On June 19, 1865, enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, heard the news of their freedom. More than two years earlier, President Abraham Lincoln had issued the Emancipation Proclamation to establish the freedom of enslaved people in Confederate States on January 1, 1863. More than two months prior, on April 9, 1865, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered. Still, many Black people remained enslaved, including approximately 250,000 in Texas. The state offered a haven to many white enslavers since no major battles occurred there throughout the Civil War, and enslavers refused to inform enslaved people of their freedom. Yet on Juneteenth in 1865—the day’s name a combination of “June” and “nineteenth”—Union troops arrived in Galveston, bringing news of the emancipation established in January 1863. There, General Gordon Granger issued General Order No. 3: “The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free.”

Organized by freed Black people in Texas the following year, celebrations of Jubilee Day occurred throughout the state, including Waco. The earliest documented Waco celebration occurred in 1876, which included a two-thousand-person procession led by the Waco Colored Band and local societies, including the Rising Stars and the Young Men’s Club. The groups waved bright-colored banners and wore dazzling uniforms. The parade ended at Waco Creek, in the southern part of the city, where celebrants listened to various speakers and a reading of the Declaration of Independence. Afterward, they danced, sang, and ate together.

Later, in 1913, Black Wacoans organized a celebration at Taborian Park, which included outdoor sports, a picnic, amusement rides, and a balloon release. In the following years, events also included free barbecue, religious services, pageants, softball games, and bicycle races. For Black airmen on James Connally Air Force Base, Juneteenth celebrations included a dance at the Franklin Avenue USO and sporting events at the Elizabeth Lee Center on South Tenth Street. Black employees in Waco also requested the day off from work, and in 1933, Bridge Street, which housed many local Black businesses, closed for part of the day as the community gathered there for a celebratory parade.

Juneteenth celebrations in Waco continued to grow over time. In 1946, the Chicago American Giants and the Memphis Red Sox, both part of the Negro American League, kicked off Juneteenth events at Katy Park, attracting over three thousand fans. These festivities also included broader activist efforts across Texas as Black leaders requested pardons for Black prisoners in the state. As early as June 19, 1925, the governor of Texas granted pardons to forty-five Black prisoners in response to the emancipation celebration day. Later, members of the Texas Legislative Black Caucus advocated for state recognition of the Juneteenth holiday. On June 19, 1979, the bill proposed by Representative Al Edwards of Houston passed, making Texas the first state to establish Juneteenth as a holiday.

Despite this acknowledgement, events that occurred on Juneteenth sometimes highlighted the complex legacies of emancipation. In Limestone County, the town of Mexia regularly hosted one of the largest Juneteenth celebrations in the country, often drawing over twenty thousand people. Those crowds dwindled after 1981, when three young Black men drowned after law enforcement arrested them during celebrations near what locals referred to as Comanche Crossing. Officers crossed Lake Mexia without providing life preservers to Anthony Freeman (18), Carl Baker (19), or Steven Booker (19). The boat began to sink twenty yards from shore, and the three teenagers, two of whom could swim, drowned. The three officers survived, and an all-white jury found them not guilty. The three teenagers’ tragic deaths struck the community hard and impacted Juneteenth celebrations, which now correspond with collective mourning and remembrance of the “Comanche Three.” While Juneteenth remains a celebration of liberation across Texas, such events left many pondering the limits of freedom and justice.

Still, as they did in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Juneteenth celebrations persist in the state and locally in Waco. Juneteenth events include sports competitions, red soda—including Waco’s own Big Red—carnival events, beauty pageants, gospel music performances, and a community-wide parade. Local organizations, including The Heart of Texas Black Chamber of Commerce and the Waco Council of African American Arts, Health & Culture, help coordinate activities throughout the city. These events that occur in Waco and throughout Texas also happen across the country as Americans celebrate emancipation. On June 17, 2021, President Biden signed a bill establishing Juneteenth as a federal holiday. Black Americans, though, have acknowledged and celebrated Juneteenth since 1865. Rejoicing in liberation, Black Wacoans, Texans, and Americans celebrate Juneteenth and recognize still the strides left toward freedom.

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Born the daughter of educators in segregated Mexia, Texas, in 1941, Mae Allison Johnson developed an early understanding of the significance of education and equality. Her parents, Allison Johnson and Eula King, met while working at a small country school called Salem in Teague, Texas. Together, they instilled the value of learning. At sixteen, Mae Johnson graduated Booker T. Washington High School as valedictorian of her class and attended college at Texas Southern University in Houston. There, fascinated by people and interested in working with others, she first thought she wanted to study sociology, but her desire to work closely with people drove her into the field of social work.

During her collegiate years at Texas Southern, she participated in debate and public speaking, traveling across Texas and around the country for competitions. These travel experiences accentuated the prevalence of segregation and discrimination. At a debate competition at Baylor University, Johnson recalled that they stayed in segregated, lower-scale housing near Paul Quinn College and remembered white Wacoans hurling insults and spitting at the Texas Southern students. These racist encounters reinforced her interest in pursuing justice, especially at the local level.

After briefly working at Riverside National Bank, the first African American-owned bank in Houston, she decided to take a social work position at John Sealy Hospital in Galveston, now part of the University of Texas Medical Branch. Her work there motivated her to return to school, and she graduated from Our Lady of the Lake University in San Antonio with a master’s degree in social work in 1965. Afterward, she relocated to Waco to be near her ailing mother in Teague, and as her mother’s health improved, Johnson moved to work in the civil rights movement.

Previously, while at Texas Southern, she helped connect those arrested in sit-ins to defense attorneys and managed funds for movement efforts. Then, in 1969, she joined the National Council of Negro Women (NCNW) and moved to Mississippi until 1971. Under the auspices of the NCNW, she sought to provide public housing for Mississippians in need, working alongside women like Fannie Lou Hamer in Indianola. Her work at the grassroots further cultivated her desire to serve local communities and meet their needs in tangible ways.

Johnson later returned to Waco, worked for the local Methodist Home, and decided to pursue her doctorate. She graduated with a PhD from the University of Texas at Arlington in 1985. As her professional life progressed, she also married Howard Andrew Jackson, with whom she had a stepdaughter, foster son, adopted daughter, and biological daughter. Motivated by her work in the civil rights movement and with the NCNW, Dr. Mae Jackson grew active in the local Democratic Party. She campaigned for Texas Democrats, including Governor Ann Richards, who later appointed Jackson to the Texas State Board of Pardons and Paroles. There, she aimed to improve racist parole policies in Texas prisons by addressing prison overcrowding, harmful living conditions, and a lack in resources needed to care for incarcerated people.

Locally, she served on the Waco City Council, District I, from 2000 to 2004 before she won the mayoral election in May 2004. Dr. Mae Jackson was the first African American woman to become mayor of Waco. During her time in office, she sought to promote education, economic development, and tourism. She sought to upgrade Waco’s Central Library, expand job opportunities in the city, rejuvenate the downtown area, and renovate the convention center. Further, she hoped to better Waco’s water quality and create improved, equitable housing. Sadly, she passed away during her first term on February 11, 2005, leaving a community in mourning. While her political career was cut short, her legacy lives on. Elected to the Waco City Council in 2018, her daughter, Andrea Jackson Barefield, represents District I. Local government leaders regularly meet in the Dr. Mae Jackson Development Center on Franklin Avenue, named in memoriam, and participate in organizations like the Greater Waco Community Education Alliance, formed from Jackson’s vision for education improvement in McLennan County. Dr. Mae Jackson’s influence on the city persists, along with her visions for equality, improved education, and justice for those in Waco, in Texas, and across the country.

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Two popular amusements at the turn of the twentieth century—staged locomotive collisions and baseball—came together in the life of Crush Holloway. As the story goes, Holloway’s father went to see the Crash at Crush, only to be informed at the event that his wife had gone into labor. He named his son, born the next day, after the train collision, and the child would go on to a successful career as a baseball player in the Negro Leagues. Though debated, it’s likely that “Crush” was the name the ballplayer received at birth rather than earned during his career.

Crush Christopher Columbus Holloway was born the eldest son of Thomas and Dora Holloway in Hillsboro, Texas, on September 16, 1896. The family moved just outside of Waco near Downsville when Holloway was a young boy. Holloway’s father was a teacher and cotton farmer. As the first son, Holloway felt the brunt of his family’s life as cotton farmers and, as a result, developed a strong dislike for the work. Baseball proved an escape. Holloway frequented sandlots around town on Sundays to play games until dusk, and during the week he worked on his swing using a broomstick and pebbles. The boy idolized players like John Franklin “Home Run” Baker and Ty Cobb. When not playing ball or working in the cotton fields, Holloway likely attended the Mt. Pleasant School in Downsville.

Holloway desired to leave Waco, and baseball eventually served as his ticket. Though he was drafted and wanted to serve in World War I, the conflict ended before he could do so. In 1919, a local businessman approached Holloway to join the Waco Black Navigators. However, the Black Navigators struggled in their inaugural season in the Texas Colored League. When they moved to San Antonio and became the Black Aces, Holloway followed. After playing alongside future Hall of Famer Biz Mackey in Waco and San Antonio, Holloway received the invitation to join him in the Negro National League and play for the Indianapolis ABCs in 1921. Holloway changed from second base to left field, and during his first season he batted a laudable .323. His aggressive base running with sharpened cleats earned him both fear and admiration from fellow players. By the end of his three seasons with the ABCs, Holloway earned a modest $150/month—approximately $2,300 today. Likely a salary dispute propelled Holloway to move to the Baltimore Black Sox in 1924.

Holloway spent the majority of his professional career in Baltimore, and he chose to return there after his retirement. For eight years he played in the Black Sox outfield. Over that time, he batted a solid .274. The Black Sox also regularly played against the white International League Baltimore Orioles, proving competitive, sometimes even superior. Sent to the Hilldale Daisies in 1929, Holloway spent the latter half of his career bouncing from club to club with stints on the Detroit Stars and Newark Eagles. Additionally, Holloway barnstormed in the offseason throughout his career. He retired in 1937 and settled in Baltimore. He worked odd jobs and eventually opened a tailor shop with Buelah, his wife since 1921. In the 1940s and 50s, to supplement his income, Holloway umpired local black baseball games and was a member of the Negro Professional Umpires Association. His love of baseball remained throughout his life.

Crush Holloway died in Baltimore from cancer on June 24, 1972. Though he fell into popular obscurity, baseball enthusiasts, scholars, and players kept Holloway’s memory alive. He enjoyed a statistically average career but made an impression through his base running. Holloway embodied the quick, assertive, and daring play that characterized much of black baseball. He, like so many other black players, excelled despite segregation and helped change the sport. Crush Holloway took his game from the cotton fields of Waco all the way to the big leagues.

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As “America’s pastime,” baseball also imbibed the country’s original sin: racism. This scourge haunted the game from its earliest days, but by the start of the twentieth century the formal segregation of baseball was complete and remained so until 1947. Nevertheless, black baseball persisted, leaving an indelible mark on the sport. While black baseball in Waco shared similarities with the game elsewhere in the nation, the players it molded and its local legacies deserve recognition. To remember baseball in the city and at Katy Park without its black teams and players is to tell only part of the story.

Starting in the 1870s, black baseball in Waco operated independently but laid the groundwork for future developments. Waco fielded several unnamed teams from the 1870s to the 1890s, one of which joined the Texas Colored Baseball League in 1888. Unfortunately, league play never materialized. From 1897 to 1898, the Waco Yellow Jackets played regionally at their home field at Golden Gate Park off of South First Street. The Yellow Jackets dominated due to the superior pitching of a preacher’s son from Calvert, Texas, named Andrew “Rube” Foster. Waco, with its booming cotton industry, presented Foster with a larger market to showcase his skills and launched his legendary career. His “fadeaway” pitch (screwball) changed baseball, and Foster’s belief in black baseball led to the formation of the professional Negro National League in 1920. As baseball entered the twentieth century, the game retained its rural connections but expanded in urban areas.

Waco produced several teams and players in the 1910s and 20s that developed the game at the semipro and professional levels. Just as Rube Foster left Texas to pursue baseball in Chicago, Waco produced two future ballplayers who would go on to play for the Negro Leagues Foster inaugurated: Andrew Lewis Cooper and Crush Holloway. Cooper, a southpaw pitcher, spent the majority of his professional baseball career as a player and manager of the Kansas City Monarchs. An outfielder known for his assertive base running, Holloway played professional ball with the Indianapolis ABCs and the Baltimore Black Sox. He began his career in 1919 with the Waco Black Navigators, the city’s premier black baseball club and a member of the Texas Colored League that played their games at Katy Park. The lives and careers of Holloway and Cooper followed the flow of the Great Migration as African Americans left the rural South for the industrial North. This movement of African Americans affected Waco’s ability to consistently provide a market for semipro black baseball. It dropped out of Texas Colored League after only a year and later sporadically participated in the Texas-Oklahoma-Louisiana League. Nevertheless, smaller recreational teams like the Waco Black Taborians played regular games at Taborian Park on South Second Street and on special occasions like Juneteenth. Multiple levels of organization continued to characterize black baseball in Waco for the next few decades.

Into the 1930s, black baseball endured in Waco exhibiting innovations to the game eventually adopted by white teams. Now a part of the Texas-Oklahoma-Louisiana League, Waco’s Black Cardinals achieved minor league status in 1930. They participated in a historic first in Texas baseball when they played the state’s initial night game in May 1930 against the visiting Kansas City Monarchs. Within weeks, Katy Park put up permanent lights for its white team, the Waco Cubs. The introduction of night baseball—because it allowed players to earn more money by playing more games—emerged out of black baseball to impact the entire sport. Additionally, black baseball introduced the practices of numbered uniforms and utilizing protective gear. The latter became a necessity due to the quick, aggressive style of play that characterized black baseball, in contrast to the white game that hinged on homeruns. While the historical record remains spotty, it appears that black baseball for the duration of its existence in Waco welcomed white spectators in a separate section. Though formally segregated, these innovations illustrate the cross-pollination that occurred between black and white baseball, advancing the game.

It was also during the 1930s that another Waco product, George T. Walker, made his debut in the Negro Leagues. Walker pitched for the Homestead Greys and the Kansas City Monarchs from 1937 to 1943. While his was not an exceptional career, the right-hander shared in the successes of his legendary teammates, Satchel Paige and Buck O’Neil. Walker continued to play baseball into the 1950s, but his career shows how the desegregation of baseball in 1947 led to the decline of the Negro Leagues and black semipro baseball. In Waco, the destruction of Katy Park from the 1953 tornado also contributed to the end of local black baseball. While it resulted in obvious benefits, the integration of baseball in Waco and around the country also meant the loss of a significant African American institution.

The semipro and independent status of black baseball in Waco does not diminish its importance. These tiers helped develop the game and its talent. Surveying this topic at the local level illustrates how national matters of racism and sports functioned in our community.

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Long before President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965, attorney Richard D. (R.D.) Evans waged the fight for civil rights from his Waco law office. As Waco’s first African American attorney, he became one of the most influential early twentieth century civil rights lawyers in Texas.

Born in Burleson County, circa 1873, Evans graduated from Prairie View Industrial College and worked as schoolteacher in Burleson County until 1909. Three years later, he graduated from Howard University’s law school and returned to Texas. Evans practiced law briefly in Brenham before settling in Waco in 1913. Slowly building a career serving the legal needs of Waco’s Black community, Evans soon established himself as the champion of Black Texans’ voting rights.

While he handled cases regarding jury selection and other civil rights, Evans rose to prominence constructing the legal challenge to the Texas white primary system. Disenfranchisement in primary elections and general opposition toward any African-American voting prompted Evans to take the case of Waco grocer E.L. Sublett in February 1919. In Sublett v. Duke, Sublett sued the Waco Democratic Executive Committee for its failure to allow African-Americans to vote in primaries. Judge George Clark ruled in favor of Sublett and Evans, a stunning decision that temporarily expanded voting rights. His success in defeating the white primary led Evans to head the Texas NAACP’s efforts to challenge the disenfranchisement at the federal level. Simultaneously, Texas moved to reinstate the white primary in 1922. Two years later, Evans brought a white primary for review by the Supreme Court. Love v. Nixon proved unsuccessful, but the language of the Justice Holmes’ majority opinion left open the possibility of a future challenge.

Evans' victories and defeats provided the precedents upon which the NAACP secured voting rights for African Americans beginning in the 1940s. In the wake of Love, the Texas NAACP, and eventually the national office, sought to make defeating the white primary one of its primary objectives. It was a struggle in which Evans remained deeply invested. The white primary persisted despite two successful Supreme Court cases—in 1927 and 1932—brought by El Paso doctor Lawrence Nixon. However, the Texas NAACP also expanded in size and scope during the 1930s due to the efforts of Evans, Juanita Craft, and A. Maceo Smith. After years of successfully litigating civil rights cases and active leadership, Evans became president of the Texas NAACP and in 1936 was elected to NAACP national board of directors. Connecting to the national NAACP brought its attorney Thurgood Marshall to Texas in late 1938 to help develop a federal legal strategy to combat the white primary. In 1944, it was Marshall’s Supreme Court case for Lonnie Smith in Smith v. Allwright that ended the over twenty year reign of the white primary in Texas.

Unfortunately, R.D. Evans did not live to see this victory. He conducted his litigation on behalf of civil rights during the 1920s and 30s under constant threat of violence to himself and his family. Still he persisted in that work. On June 26, 1938, a train in downtown Waco collided with a car driven by Evans, killing him. The circumstances surrounding Evans' death remain dubious, but likely unresolvable. He is buried in Greenwood Cemetery. Evans’ life-long dedication to civil rights made him a seminal figure in securing equal voting rights for African-Americans in Texas. When President Johnson signed the 1965 Voting Rights Act it served as the culmination of years of grassroots efforts by Evans and many others to ensure the voting rights of all Americans, regardless of color.

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Despite many obstacles, Robert Gilbert offered “no excuses” when he found himself at the forefront of enacting racial integration and advancing civil rights in Waco. His efforts left an indelible mark on the city and Baylor University.

He was born on December 27, 1941, the fourth child of the Rev. B. F. Gilbert and his wife, Fannie Mae. The Gilbert household prized faith in God, education, and community service. Attending Waco’s segregated schools, Gilbert wanted to be a lawyer advancing the rights of African Americans. After graduating from A. J. Moore High School in 1960, he enrolled at Paul Quinn College. Following several years of study at Paul Quinn, Gilbert and his teachers realized a future legal career required he obtain a degree from Baylor University, which had only recently—in November 1963—voted to integrate.

Administrative and legal decisions do not generate immediate cultural change, a reality that confronted Gilbert as he began his studies at Baylor in summer 1965. The alienation and animosity he felt as a child growing up near the campus continued to form a large part of his experience as a student. He experienced isolation from his classmates, and while some faculty treated him with dignity, others proved overtly racist. Gilbert majored in history, which he enjoyed, but he soon acknowledged that a legal career was increasingly unlikely. For most of his adolescence, Gilbert resisted pastoral ministry, but soon the call to preach became too acute to ignore. In addition, doctors advised him that his poor health could not handle the stresses of practicing law.

Since the age of fourteen, Gilbert suffered from various types of arthritis that left him in constant pain and with impaired mobility. In his teens, it proved manageable with only an occasional flare-up. However, in July 1963, his condition deteriorated rapidly. Gilbert recovered and returned to college, though he now required a cane for support. Later on, joint deterioration led to numerous surgeries and eventually put him in a wheelchair. The visible specter of his arthritis plagued Gilbert for his entire life, but it also became the source of his testimony and vocation. Grappling with his arthritis proved God’s way of grabbing hold of Gilbert, calling him to a life of ministry and teaching, as well as instilling in him the faith and endurance required to overcome all impediments that lay ahead.

Gilbert’s faith-filled perseverance equipped him to break barriers and gave him an unquenchable thirst for justice. On June 2, 1967, Robert Gilbert became the first African American student to graduate from Baylor. By virtue of alphabetical order, Gilbert preceded his classmate Barbara Walker, who that day became Baylor’s first female African American graduate. After his graduation, Gilbert continued pioneering as the first black teacher at the all-white Tennyson Middle School. Another first included his summer role as assistant director of Baylor’s Upward Bound program to help train low-income students for college. Gilbert carried on all this work while also actively engaging in pastoral ministry.

To enrich his ministry, Gilbert returned to Baylor in 1970 to pursue a graduate degree in religion. However, another devastating turn in his health in 1971 left him unable to finish his studies, but not to pastor. He succeeded his father into the pulpits of Baptist churches in Bremond and Chilton, before in 1978, beginning a more than decade-long ministry at Waco’s Carver Park Missionary Baptist Church. Under his leadership, the congregation grew exponentially. Gilbert’s dynamic sermons and visible witness attracted people to him and to the gospel. His life held the power to convict and inspire, not only the people in his congregations, but all Wacoans as well.

The 1970s saw Gilbert take up his trailblazing mantel and use his status in the community to advocate for civil rights. Upset about the glacial pace of integration in Waco schools after the 1954 Brown decision, Gilbert served as the plaintiff in the NAACP case against the Waco Independent School District. His suit, combined with a similar case from Waco’s Hispanic community, became the 1973 Arvizu v. Waco ISD decision mandating the integration of several racially identifiable schools in Waco. In 1976, he was elected the first black member of Waco’s school board. Outside of education, Gilbert helmed the Association for Selective Career Opportunities that aimed to advance the hiring of minorities in fields where they were underrepresented. His experiences at the forefront of integration made him a catalyst for creating opportunities for other African Americans in Waco.

When he died on November 11, 1992, Robert Gilbert left a rich legacy of ministry and activism. In the last years of his life, through pain and numerous health struggles, he maintained his pastoral ministry, while also advocating for Waco and Baylor to diversify hiring. Today Gilbert’s communities honor his impact. For example, the Waco NAACP awards scholarships to high school graduates named for the Gilbert family. Captured by his 1988 autobiography title, No Excuses Accepted, Gilbert believed everyone was capable of achieving their goals, no matter the impediments. Grounded in faith and in pursuit of justice, he testified to that belief with his life, calling others to do the same.

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Beginning in 1945, the sounds of big bands, the blues, and rock blended on the dance floor of East Waco’s Walker’s Auditorium.

Continually looking for ways to serve his community, African American entrepreneur Herbert Walker founded the club. Prior to opening the venue, Mr. Walker provided his neighbors with leisure and transportation through his taxi stand and stables. Later he added a BBQ pit and apartment buildings to his business portfolio. As the only establishment of its kind open to blacks, Walker’s Auditorium served as a prominent social spot for Waco’s African American community. Its pea green, maroon, and grey interior was complemented with elegant furnishings, a sizable dance floor, pool tables, and a mirrored bar that offered patrons drinks and entrées. Mr. Walker told a local paper he envisioned the spot as offering “Wacoans a good place to go for amusement.”

Walker’s Auditorium operated as part of the “Chitlin’ Circuit,” a cross-country touring route used by black entertainers prevented by segregation from playing in white-only locations. A network of black-owned and -patronized businesses, the circuit created an opportunity for African American artists to freely express themselves and their experiences. By being a stop on this route, Walker’s Auditorium connected blacks in Central Texas to national trends in African American social and cultural life. It fueled creativity but was a grueling lifestyle. Musical acts such as Ike and Tina Turner, James Brown, B.B. King, and Etta James, all of whom would go on to greater success, played Walker’s Auditorium for gigs of a night or two when they traveled through Texas in the 1950s and 60s. They went on to other clubs, but some of the talent drawn to Waco by Walker’s Auditorium decided to stay in the area.

In 1963, Herbert Walker invited Louisiana-born blues musician Classie Ballou to lead his house band. Ballou played music all across the world, but his growing family made Walker’s invitation of localized work appealing. As often as six nights a week, Ballou provided the soundtrack at Walker’s Auditorium. When business diminished for Walker’s Auditorium and the rest of the Chitlin’ Circuit, Ballou chose to remain in Waco playing regular gigs around town.

Outside its primary function as a music venue, Walker’s Auditorium hosted holiday parties, debutant balls, parades, and various celebrations. Fraternities and sororities like Alpha Phi Alpha used the club for dances and gatherings. In 1953, it held a fundraiser for the March of Dimes. Civic clubs and organizations also used the space for business functions and teas. Walker’s Auditorium provided Waco’s African American community with a multipurpose venue suited both for amusement and formal meetings.

The patrons of Walker’s Auditorium, however, were not exclusively African American. White Wacoans, and many Baylor students, also frequented the club. “Mingling” between whites and blacks occurred more frequently by the 1960s, than in previous decades of the club’s operation. This shift resulted in broader acknowledgement of the club by all Waco’s citizens. Community members, like state senator Murray Watson, met with Mr. Walker and held him in high esteem. Additionally, local and student newspapers, whose racialized reporting on Walker’s Auditorium early on tended to revolve around petty crime, now increasingly carried advertisements and other news about the establishment in the 1960s and early 1970s. It is in this era that it became a community institution, expanding Mr. Walker’s vision to its fullest extent.

The advent of the civil rights movement, the closing of James Connally Air Force Base, and competition from other entertainment eventually hurt Walker’s Auditorium. Like many venues on the Chitlin’ Circuit, it fell into disrepair. In 1977, Walker’s Auditorium came under new management, but only a year later it ceased operating. By the 2000s, nothing remained where the legendary venue once stood. Through over three decades of operation, Walker’s Auditorium gave Wacoans, particularly its black citizens, a place to relax and celebrate.

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During the 1950s and 1960s, Rev. Marvin C. Griffin strove to bring the Christian gospel to bear upon the civil rights struggle in Waco. As minister of New Hope Baptist Church from 1951 to 1969, Reverend Griffin preached a message of spiritual vitality and social action, advocating for racial equality during a period of heightened tensions among Waco’s white, black, and Hispanic communities. Griffin’s unswerving emphasis on racial justice and reconciliation established him as a respected leader throughout Central Texas.

The future minister was born in Wichita, Kansas, in 1923 and, after several years in Oklahoma, spent his later childhood and adolescence in Dallas, Texas. Like many African American families in their community, the Griffin family suffered the effects of race-based inequality. The scarcity of Depression-era jobs for black men meant that Griffin’s mother supported the family on wages from her job as housekeeper in a white home. The young Griffin, however, felt called to become a preacher and exhibited academic promise at an early age.

After high school, Griffin entered Bishop College—at that time the only Texas institution offering a degree in religion to African American students. There he met Lois King, whom he married in 1944 and with whom he would serve churches and communities throughout Texas for over six decades. After graduating from Bishop in 1943, Griffin earned a bachelor of divinity in theology from the famed Oberlin College in Ohio. Oberlin’s emphasis on the social implications of the Christian message shaped Griffin’s approach to civil rights in the years to come. Griffin graduated from Oberlin in 1947 and soon took a position as director of city missions for the Southern Baptist Convention’s Home Mission Board in Dallas, Texas. There, the young graduate worked with people in need from white and black neighborhoods alike. In this way, Griffin’s diverse childhood, educational, and professional experiences allowed him to cultivate relationships across racial and economic lines.

In 1951, Waco’s New Hope Baptist Church invited Griffin to fill in as interim pastor when its own minister, Dr. Joseph Newton Jenkins, fell ill. This temporary position became permanent when Jenkins passed away, and the twenty-seven-year-old seminary graduate found himself the pastor of one of Waco’s oldest and most prominent African American churches. The young minister took to the position quickly, however, pioneering a radio ministry and citywide transportation system to the church on Sunday. All the while, Griffin devoted himself to theological study; in 1955 he became the first African American to receive a master of religious education from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.

Griffin also brought a renewed emphasis on the social resonances of the Christian gospel, preaching the importance of advocating for justice in the wake of pervasive racial discrimination. In Waco, the new pastor entered an environment in which white hostility was prevalent and in which local blacks were hesitant to confront racial divides for fear that their jobs, social standing, and physical safety might be jeopardized.

Their fears were not unfounded. When initial efforts to integrate Waco schools following the Brown v. Board of Education decision were stymied by public backlash, it appeared that the desegregation project had reached a standstill. White leaders took no initiative toward implementing the federal ruling, and area blacks balked at taking any serious form of action. For the remainder of the decade, little progress was made in the dismantling of legalized segregation.

Thanks to leaders such as Marvin Griffin, the tide began to turn during the 1960s, bringing about an integration that proved far more peaceful—albeit far more gradual—than many cities in the South. As the nationwide struggle for civil rights grew more visible and more tumultuous, Waco minorities became increasingly vocal in their calls for desegregation and equal access to employment. Leading white Chamber of Commerce members—dubbed “The Committee of Fifty”—were anxious to avoid the protests, sit-ins, and violence plaguing much of the South. When the committee expressed the desire to cooperate with Waco’s black community leaders in desegregating the city at long last, Marvin Griffin set to work forming a council comprised of seven prominent African American men and women. With Griffin as its chairman, the council sought input from all corners of Waco’s black population to formulate a list of the most pressing racial issues to be remedied. These included public accommodations, the use of recreational facilities, access to jobs, and representation on boards and commissions.

The Committee of Fifty proved open to cooperation. It and Griffin’s council were careful, however, to keep their deliberations secret, lest they arouse anger from the white community. Thus, in 1961, they privately crafted a plan for the gradual and quiet desegregation of Waco businesses, cooperating with journalists to ensure that the press would refrain from reporting on the committee’s existence and the instances of desegregation that followed. Facility by facility, the group worked with business owners and the designated African American citizens—often Griffin and the members of his council—who would patronize each establishment. By means of enforcement, several members of the committee threatened to fire employees who did not carry out the new policy of desegregation. By 1963, popular Waco eating establishments, hospitals, and department stores had desegregated in this manner. Additionally, Baylor president Abner McCall—a member of the Committee of Fifty—began to take steps in the desegregation of Baylor University, which was finally desegregated in 1964.

Public desegregation, however, was only the first step in a long and arduous road toward a more racially equitable society. Accordingly, Griffin remained unwavering in his advocacy for Waco’s black community even after this initial wave of desegregation. The pastor worked to secure job opportunities for Waco’s African American citizens, and he also continued to fight for the desegregation of the Waco Independent School District, which would ultimately desegregate by federal court order in the early 1970s. Griffin also continued to facilitate racial reconciliation in local churches as well, exchanging pulpits with white preachers such as Rhea Gray and holding interracial book clubs in homes to facilitate productive dialogue on issues of race. In the political sphere, Griffin worked to expand black voter registration and galvanized his congregation and others into a politically active community.

In 1969, Griffin accepted an offer to become pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Austin, Texas—a position in which he served until his retirement on July 31, 2011. Here the twin goals of Christian faithfulness and social action remained paramount in Griffin’s ministry. In 1998, the pastor spearheaded the creation of the East Austin Economic Development Corporation, which offered crucial services to underprivileged populations. The spiritual and social leader continued to advance in learning and education even in latter decades of his career; in 1990, Griffin received his doctor of ministry from Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary. Throughout his long and storied life, Griffin never wavered in his insistence that the Christian message was inseparable from the issue of racial justice and community involvement, and he continued to encourage Christian faithfulness and social activism among his congregants at Ebenezer.

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The Ku Klux Klan (KKK) stands as one of the most infamous secret societies in American history. The white robes and pointed masks symbolize prejudice, terror, and fear to Americans nationwide. Waco itself, and the greater McLennan County area, served as a hotbed of Klan activity at various times over the last century.

The KKK was founded in Tennessee in 1866, but by 1868, Texas had multiple Klan chapters all loosely organized under the statewide leadership of Roger Q. Mills. As Reconstruction played out across the state, their goal was the preservation of white supremacy and white-Democrat control of the government. This first wave of Klan presence stayed mostly relegated to North and East Texas, with Klansmen wreaking havoc on communities by burning homes and fields, beating and killing African Americans, and terrorizing politicians and community leaders until its dissolution in 1871. No evidence exists of a Waco KKK chapter in the late nineteenth century, but the KKK’s official arrival in Waco came with the reconstituted Klan of the twentieth century.

At the beginning of the century, resentment toward “foreign” peoples in America such as Catholics, Jews, and African Americans grew as World War I fostered white-nativist and isolationist sentiments across the country. Popular movies such as The Birth of a Nation then further normalized the existence of the Klan and its racial ideology. This led to the reorganization of the KKK in 1915 by the son of a Reconstruction-era Klansman, William J. Simmons, in Georgia. The reconstituted Klan spread like wildfire across the country, including new klaverns in every corner of Texas by the early 1920s. Though the exact date of the chapter's founding is unknown, Erwin J. Clark soon emerged as the leader of Waco's Saxet Klan Number 33 around 1921. He served as the Great Titan of the Waco Province and attorney for the Realm of Texas. Under his leadership, the Waco Klan set out policing the town and surveilling “immoral individuals,” sometimes even chasing them out of town with threats of tar and feathering. At least one man, Kennedy Cummings, actually fell victim to tar and feathering in 1921 after he did not heed a warning from the Klan to leave Waco. Outside of these extralegal measures, the Waco Klan allied itself with local law enforcement, even helping pay bounties for fugitives.

The Waco Klavern also set about recruiting Protestant pastors, thereby legitimizing Klan presence through religious associations and strong fundamentalist rhetoric. Klansmen often paraded into local churches, offered the preacher free membership and a “Kludd”—or chaplain—position, and made a donation in front of the entire congregation. The Waco Klan was known to even give pastors up to one hundred dollars, a sizable sum in the early 1920s. The pastor usually accepted and then preached a pro-Klan sermon about preserving the moral integrity of the nation, though some like First Baptist pastor Joseph Dawson refused to join or associate with the Klan. The Klan would also make appearances at community church events, such as the 1921 Clay Street Methodist Church’s Christmas celebration, where they passed out free gifts and treats.

These actions functioned as an effective recruitment technique, as the 1921 initiation ceremony inducted 937 men, with another 210 turned away because the building was full. With its numbers continuing to swell, the Klan soon had a tight hold on the Waco community. It controlled commerce by declaring that Klansmen were required to shop at Klan-owned stores and also to harass businesses owned by Catholics and Jews. To make these distinctions clear, a white card with black bars was displayed in the windows of Klan-friendly businesses around town.

An incident known as the Lorena Riot further bolstered the Klan’s influence and hampered that of official law enforcement. After a successful parade in Mart, the Klavern looked to march in Lorena on October 1, 1921. Four thousand residents of Waco and Lorena turned out to watch the spectacle. McLennan County Sheriff Bob Buchanan approached the parade and asked the leaders to identify themselves. The leaders, as with any Klansmen, refused to reveal their identities. Lorena locals tried to reason with the sheriff, but he refused to let the parade continue. At 9:30 p.m. the parade began regardless, with Klansmen marching two by two, led by a burning cross and an American flag. Sheriff Buchanan tried to pull the mask off of one Klansman and suddenly a shot rang out. Then multiple shots were heard and Sheriff Buchanan armed himself with a knife. In the scuffle of guns and knives, Buchanan suffered a gunshot wound to his right arm, five men were stabbed, and one other was shot in the neck. One of the stabbing victims, Louis Crow, later died of his wound. The community quickly backed the Klan and demanded legal action against the sheriff, known to be the man who stabbed Crow. Judge Richard Munroe called upon the McLennan County grand jury to investigate, and it indicted Buchanan for Crow’s murder. The next McLennan County election in 1922 then witnessed the victory of the “Ku Klux Klan ticket,” for positions such as county sheriff and county attorney. By the next year the Klan was bold enough to parade two thousand members through town. The riot strengthened the Klan’s hold on Waco public opinion, and as a result Waco politics as well.

The KKK then set its sights on higher political office: the state senate. In what was known as the “Waco Agreement,” four Grand Titans met in Waco at the Raleigh Hotel to decide which senate candidate the Klan would support. Three different Klansmen were in the running at the time, so it was not a straightforward decision. They decided to let the Klan choose by declaring an open race with the understanding that the trailing Klansmen would drop out when the time came. One of the candidates, Wacoan Robert Henry, ran openly as a Klansman, showing the legitimacy of the KKK at the state and national level. Klan officials ended up reneging the Waco Agreement and supporting Earle Mayfield, who did not run openly as a Klansman, over Henry and the third candidate Sterling Strong because of his ties to big business. Mayfield went on to win the Democratic primary. But the agreement and Henry’s candidacy show the extent to which Waco was a center for Klan authority.

Yet the KKK’s day in the sun left as quickly as it arrived. Klansman Felix D. Robertson decided to run for governor against Miriam “Ma” Ferguson in 1924. Though not running openly as a Klansman, Robertson had long alluded to his membership by his public defense of the organization. His first campaign stop was Waco in February 1924. Robertson won the first Democratic primary, and the Waco Klan held a massive parade down Austin Avenue in celebration. But the Klan itself experienced problems as upper-class and lower-class members fought over the purpose of the organization, the former wanting more political control and the latter still focused on vigilantism and extralegal violence. Communities like Waco were also growing apprehensive about the rise in mob violence that accompanied the influx of lower-class individuals to the Klan. Robertson was unwilling to condemn Klan violence and assuage these fears, so he lost the primary runoff to Ferguson as a result. This proved to be the death knell for KKK dominance in Waco and the state at large. By 1927 the Waco Klan had sold all its property.

The 1920s proved to be the first wave of KKK activity in Waco, but not the last. By the 1950s, Klan ideology was alive and well in Waco once more. Horace Sherman Miller joined the KKK after Brown vs Board of Education in 1954 and was a Texas Kleagle until 1957. That same year, he decided to start a mail-order chapter, the Aryan Knights of the KKK. His home served as the headquarters, as tuberculosis had made him an invalid, and he wrote the newsletter with a typewriter set up over his bed. Though based in Waco, his newsletter had readership across the country as civil rights challenged the racial ideas of the nation. Miller’s newsletter enjoyed success until it ended with his death in 1964.

The KKK would not come around again officially until the 1990s, though it is possible that the organization existed in some form underground. Dallas Klansmen came out into the public eye again in 1993 to criticize the FBI’s handling of the Branch Davidian siege. They traveled to Waco and claimed the Klan had a much more effective plan for extricating the Davidians, but they refused to elaborate on any extralegal measures. Further, the Texas Knights of the KKK, led by Michael Lowe, gained prominence in the mid-1990s and had a base in Waco.

The KKK has a long and controversial history in Waco. But there have also always been Wacoans willing to fight back against the Klan and the prejudice it preaches. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Traditional American Knights of the KKK have a headquarters in Waco today, but membership is extremely small and incidents very infrequent.

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Among the names of the many individuals who served valiantly during World War II, Waco’s own Doris Miller was a hero of national and international acclaim. Although many noted the valor he displayed during the war, some argue he still has not received the honors due him.

Born as the third of four sons to Connery and Henrietta Miller on October 12, 1919, Doris, named for the midwife present at his birth, grew up on a small sharecrop farm just outside of Waco in Speegleville, Texas. Years later, Henrietta Miller admitted that she had hoped for a baby girl, and her wishful thinking led to the feminine name, despite her husband’s protests. 

Along with his siblings, Doris worked to support the family farm from an early age. In his youth, he became an excellent marksman as he hunted for small game with his brothers. Doris also had a successful school career at A. J. Moore High School. His tall stature gained the attention of the football coach at the school who recruited Doris as a fullback on the team.

However, as Doris became older, and as war loomed on the horizon, he longed to join the armed forces much to the chagrin of his parents. After several attempts to join different sectors of the military, Doris Miller enlisted in the US Navy in Dallas, Texas, on September 16, 1939. Unfortunately, at the time of his enlistment, discrimination limited the areas of service for African Americans in the military. After training, his assignment was as a mess attendant, third class. It was from this station that Miller answered the call in extraordinary circumstances.

Assigned to the USS West Virginia anchored at Pearl Harbor, on December 7, 1941, Doris was collecting laundry in the hull of the ship when the attack began, according to some reports. As the air raid sirens started, Doris Miller burst into action. When he ran to the deck of the ship, he saw his captain sprawled, fatally wounded, on the ground. Miller pulled the wounded captain to safety before racing back to an unmanned antiaircraft gun in the midst of low-flying planes and a rain of bullets. Despite discriminatory policies that forbade Miller or other sailors of color to man heavy artillery, Miller seized control of a .50 caliber machine gun to fire at attacking Japanese planes. He committed his efforts to the defense of the West Virginia until superiors ordered all to abandon ship. Conflicting accounts exist of Miller’s actions that day, but the most widely circulated reports won him quick and international attention. 

After the attack, the military awarded Miller with an unprecedented honor. He became the first African American recipient of the Navy Cross, the highest decoration the navy can offer besides the Congressional Medal of Honor. The navy leveraged Miller’s new status by returning him to the home front for a short time to act as a recruiter. In 1943, Miller received a promotion to petty officer, ship’s cook third class, and was assigned to the escort carrier USS Liscome Bay. That November, in the Battle of Makin Island, a Japanese torpedo struck the Liscome Bay and the ship sunk within minutes. Miller did not survive the attack.

While awarded the Purple Heart posthumously, Doris Miller never received the Congressional Medal of Honor, which many believe he deserved. Those who fight for his legacy still lobby for its award.

Though his life was cut short due to the call of active duty, Doris Miller lives on in public memory. Throughout the nation, streets, schools, and parks bear his name. In Waco, his hometown, stands the Doris D. Miller Park and the Doris Miller Family YMCA, active reminders of one African American man’s willingness to serve his country despite its discriminatory practices. Cultural Arts of Waco is currently raising money for a Doris Miller Memorial to be located on the east bank of the Brazos River.

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