What happened to Zion Cemetery?

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Radar finds more than 120 coffins buried beneath Tampa apartment complex

The news brings residents of Robles Park Village to tears. The place where they live was built on the site of long-forgotten Zion Cemetery.

By Paul Guzzo | Published August 30, 2019 | TAMPA BAY TIMES

This image is a 3D laser scan of Robles Park Village showing subsurface results in relation to the buildings. The red and/or blue rectangles represent buried objects in the shape of graves superimposed on the 3D imagery. These results are from two different data sources and they align with historical maps of the former Zion Cemetery.

Zion Cemetery has been found.

Ground-penetrating radar has detected what appear to be more than 120 coffins under an apartment complex in Tampa, the remains of the lost cemetery revealed by the Tampa Bay Times.  The 2½-acre, segregation-era burial ground, believed to be the city’s first for African-Americans, was established in 1901 along the 3700 block of Florida Ave. and extended back around 400 feet.  It disappeared nearly a century ago when the land was parceled off for white developments.

No one tried to find it until now.

The radar confirmed that Zion is still there, parts of it at least, under ground that today is home to the back of the Robles Park Village public housing complex owned by the Tampa Bay Housing Authority.

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