Baylor University acknowledged a long-unrecognized part of its history on Nov. 7 by dedicating a Memorial to Enslaved Persons on Founders Mall.
The memorial grew out of a report and series of recommendations by Baylor’s Commission on Historic Campus Representations in 2020-2021.
It recognizes the role enslaved laborers played in the university’s construction and confesses race-based chattel slavery built the wealth of many of Baylor’s early benefactors and founders.
It specifically acknowledges Judge R.E.B. Baylor — whose statue long has anchored Founders Mall and for whom the university is named — owned enslaved people.
The memorial includes Scripture references, a cascading water feature constructed of the same limestone used to build Baylor’s original campus in Independence, a population density map depicting the number of enslaved people in Central Texas in 1860 and a resonance garden for reflection.
EDITOR’S NOTE — This story was written by Ken Camp and originally published by Baptist Standard.
