The National Park Service is asking the city of Waco to rededicate land around the Texas Ranger Museum as a historic cemetery, remove some roads in the area and have it dedicated as a State Archaeological Landmark.

Those are some of the steps proposed in a draft memorandum of understanding, recently made public, that would release 17 acres of Fort Fisher Park from restrictions imposed by a federal park grant in the late 1960s.

Archaeologists have been excavating remains around the Texas Ranger Museum annex. The discovery of some 200 bodies delayed the opening of the Texas Ranger Company F headquarters. (Duane A. Laverty photo)

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Past coverage

• 07-21-09  Waco City Council to consider 2 downtown TIF projects tonight 
• 07-20-09  Waco City Council to consider doling out more money for excavation work near Ranger museum 
• 05-12-09  National Park Service wants historic cemetery designation and other changes around Waco's Texas Ranger Museum 
• 12-16-08  Waco City Council to decide whether to spend another nearly $500,000 for Rangers Museum work 
• 10-29-08  Cemetery 'debacle' at Ranger Museum site will bring about new legislation, lawmaker says 
• 10-08-08  City of Waco countersues archaeological firm in Texas Ranger Museum project 
• 09-23-08  State legislator tours burial site at Texas Ranger Museum expansion 
• 09-08-08  Political charges fly over graveyard dig at Ranger Museum 
• 09-06-08  State calls inquiry on graves at Ranger museum site 
• 09-05-08  State funeral hearing's focus shifts to graves at Texas Ranger Museum expansion 
• 09-04-08  State agency hearing in Waco today on families' access to graves 
• 05-07-08  City OKs spending up to $350,000 to dig beneath graves for water line to museum 
• 05-06-08  Letting First Street Cemetery dead rest in peace will come at a cost, city leaders say 
• 04-27-08  Descendants of First Street Cemetery dead plea for peace at long last 
• 04-02-08  Museum grounds may be re-dedicated as old cemetery 
• 03-23-08  DEAD WRONG: Bad assumptions, ignorance played havoc with old city cemetery 
• 03-08-08  Firm says city mismanaged burial site at Ranger museum 
• 11-13-07  Grave concerns bedevil Texas Ranger Hall of Fame project 
• 08-06-07  Texas Ranger Museum gets OK to resume construction at site where bones were unearthed 
• 07-24-07  State officials scrutinizing loose human bones, ambitious museum plans 
• 07-20-07  Missing bones cause big beef for city, museum officials 
• 07-19-07  A bone to pick: Case of exposed skeletal remains 'gone awry' 

The site is to be “converted” to nonpark use and replaced with other parkland upstream at the Waco Mammoth Site.

The National Park Service also recently declared the 157-year-old cemetery site eligible for a listing in the National Register of Historic Places.

The draft memorandum of understanding on the conversion is available for public inspection and comment at www.waco-texas.com.

Assistant City Attorney Annette Jones said the city basically is in agreement with the memorandum but will seek some “minor tweaking” of the language.

T. Bradford Willis, a dentist and amateur historian who has criticized the city’s handling of the graves, said the memorandum would help ensure respect for the dead.

“I would hope the city would want to honor the pioneers of Waco, black, white, Asian and Hispanic, that are buried in the cemetery,” he said. “This is a wonderful starting point, though it needs input from consulting parties to make it better.”

The park service conversion process complicates an archaeological headache already under way at Fort Fisher Park.

The museum and Fort Fisher Park were built on the eastern side of the old First Street Cemetery in 1968, after it was cleared of gravestones and some human remains. The federal Land and Water Conservation Fund helped develop the park as a recreation and camping spot, obligating the city to preserve it for recreational use permanently.

Some 200 human remains have been discovered and excavated in the last two years as the city has attempted to add a Texas Ranger regional headquarters behind the museum. The discoveries have delayed the project and added some $1.9 million to its cost.

Late last year, the city discovered it also would have to officially convert the area to nonpark use because of the construction. That process includes what is known as a Section 106 review under the National Historic Preservation Act to ensure that historic resources are protected.

The review concluded that the area in question included part of the historic First Street Cemetery and that the conversion would cause “adverse impacts” to the cemetery. City officials had argued that the developed eastern side of Fort Fisher could no longer be considered a cemetery because it had been “cleared” under the old court order. The memorandum of understanding makes no distinction between the east side and the west side, which is currently marked as First Street Cemetery.

The National Park Service’s stipulations are meant to mitigate the adverse impacts. In addition to road removal, rededication and commemorative plaques, the stipulations include gathering information on the cemetery and storing it at a local library.

The draft agreement also directs the city to make “a decision regarding the disposition of remains under the new education building,” referring to part of the nearly completed Texas Ranger annex.

Jones, the assistant city attorney, declined to comment on the possibility that there are human remains under the annex. She said that question is part of ongoing litigation between the city and its former archaeologist, American Archaeology, which was paid to study the site before construction began.

John Griggs, an archaeologist who worked under contract for that firm, said he believes there are remains there. He produced a copy of a May 22, 2008, e-mail that an official with the city’s new archaeology contractor, PBS&J of Austin, sent to an official with the Texas Historical Commission.

According to the e-mail, workers came across a burial that “extends underneath the building or right up to the foundation, at least.”

Griggs has battled the city on its handling of the graves since American Archaeology was fired in early 2008. He said he pushed for the National Register listing as a way to protect the remaining graves at the site.

jbsmith@wacotrib.com

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