Highland Cemetery (Kansas City, MO) (Tour)

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1. Frank Duncan (1901-1973)

Frank Lee Duncan, Jr., was an outstanding catcher and manager for the Kansas City Monarchs. In 1941, his son Frank Duncan III joined the team, and they became the first father-and-son battery in major league baseball. In 1945, as Monarchs manager, Duncan became Jackie Robinson’s first manager in professional baseball. For a time, he was married to Blues and jazz singer Julia Lee, At the age of 72, Duncan passed away on 4 December 1973 in Kansas City, Missouri, and buried in Highland Cemetery.

2. Julia Lee (1902-1958)

Kansas City jazz icon Julia Lee built a national reputation as one of the greatest blues singers, but she was best known locally, where she was a mainstay of Miltion's and other Kansas City establishments on 12th Street. Lee got her start playing piano and singing in her brother George E. Lee's Orchestra from 1920 to 1934. With a strong local following and a handful of hits, Lee produced a four-volume album with Capitol Records in 1944. While most musicians of the era traveled nationally, Julia Lee preferred to perform for local audiences in Kansas City where she earned a reputation not only for being a talented performer but for remembering the favorite songs of her regulars.

3. Bennie Moten

Benjamin “Bennie” Moten was an influential pianist and bandleader whose career was essential to the development of Kansas City-style jazz. Moten grew up in Kansas City and took up the piano at an early age, learning his craft from two of Scott Joplin’s former students. He attended Lincoln High School but left before graduating to pursue a career in music and, in 1918, joined two fellow entertainers in forming the B.B.&D. Orchestra. He put together the Bennie Moten Orchestra four years later.

4. Thomas C. Unthank (1866-1932)

Dr. Thomas C. Unthank was instrumental in creating opportunities for Black doctors to serve the inner city and established medical facilities. As a physician and activist, he rose to prominence as a doctor and is known as the “Father of Kansas City’s Negro Hospitals.” In July of 1933, in honor of his life-long commitment to attaining a better standard of living for Kansas City’s African American community, a bust of Dr. Unthank was unveiled in front of General Hospital No. 2.

5. Richard T Coles (1859-1930

Richard Thomas Coles founded vocational schools

6. Daniel Arthur Holmes (1876-1972)

Born in Macon, Missouri in 1876, Rev. Holmes was a passionate leader not only in the church but in the community. He was respected for his work in political and social affairs, especially as he was able to connect white and Black religious leaders on issues of race and culture. From 1921 to 1967, he served as the pastor of Paseo (Vine Street) Baptist Church

7. Lafayette Tillman (1858-1914)

Lafayette Alonzo Tillman was born 15 March 1858, in Evansville, Indiana, to Thomas and Harriet Tillman, and would go on to become one of the exceptional Black leaders in Kansas City by the turn of the twentieth century. His legacy is mostly known has one of the first African American citizens to be appointed to the Kansas City police force. Tillman was a pillar of the community operating a barber shop, providing legal services and managing a restaurant.

8. T. B. Watkins (1887-1960) and John T Watkins (1873-1917)

Beginning in 1909, John T Watkins (known at "J.T.") and his brother Theron (known as T.B.") Watkins founded the Watkins Brothers Funeral Home at 1729 Lydia Avenue. The funeral home later moved to 18th Street and Benton Boulevard, and finally at 4000 Emmanuel Cleaver II Boulevard. T. B. Watkins was the first African American appointed to a draft board in Kansas City and was a co-founder of the Gateway Athletic Association, a youth sports organization. T.B. Watkins was also the stepfather of powerful and influential Black political leader Bruce Watkins.

9. Chester A. Franklin (1880-1955)

In 1919, Chester Arthur Franklin established The Kansas City Call which would become the leading African American newspaper in the city.

10. Ada Crogman Franklin

Born in Atlanta in the mid 1880s, Ada Crogman graduated college in Boston and worked as a teacher where she authored a stage production dedicated to African American history and culture. While the show she authored was touring, she met Kansas City Call publisher Chester Franklin and the pair married in 1925. The Franklins operated the Call for years and Ada Cogman Franklin took over leadership of the paper when her husband passed away in 1955. Until her death in 1983, Ada Cogman Franklin served as the publisher of the Call.

11. Fredericka Douglass Sprague Perry (1872-1943)

A granddaughter of Frederick Douglass, Fredericka Douglass Sprague Perry taught at Lincoln University and married physician John Edward Perry in 1912. John Perry founded Kansas City's Wheatley-Provident Hospital and Fredricka established the Missouri State Association of Colored Girls and Kansas City's Colored Big Sister Home for Girls in 1934.

This Tour is a Virtual Museum or Site Tour.

Highland Cemetery (Kansas City, MO)

Created by NEH EDSITEment on February 13th 2020, 8:55:00 pm.

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For close to six decades, Highland Cemetery served as one of three private cemeteries open to African Americans in Kansas City. Established in 1909, it became the final resting place for more than 11,000 people before 1950. Among them were Bennie Moten, the famous jazz pianist; civil rights activist Daniel Arthur Holmes; granddaughter of Frederick Douglass, Fredericka Douglass Prague Sperry; and thousands more. When, in 1964, segregated cemeteries were made illegal, the resources that had maintained Highland Cemetery (through payment for burials) flowed instead to previously white cemeteries. Highland Cemetery fell into disrepair, though recent efforts by local students have attempted to clean up the cemetery and honor the many people interred there.

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Highland Cemetery (Kansas City, MO)

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