FORT BEND, Texas – A new Fort Bend Independent School District elementary school will be built on a former prison farm.
Historically, prison farms are a place where convicts were forced to work for free, some even being worked to their deaths.
In 2018, during the district’s construction of the James C. Reese Career and Technical Center, human remains were uncovered onsite. The location was a former prison farm similar to the land Harlem Road near Pecan Drive— what will be home to the FBISD’s Harvest Green Elementary School.
“Nobody would believe him,” Marilyn Moore, President of Friends of Sugar Land 95, said.
Moore said her late husband Reginald dedicated his life to uncovering the truth about convict leasing and prison farms.
“Convict leasing is where prisoners were leased to land owners to work agriculture work— in this particular case sugarcane fields,” she said.
She’s referring to a plot of land along Harlem Road in Richmond once known as the Harlem Prison Farm.
“It was an agreement with the state of Texas and local landowners here,” she said. “Slavery was over and they needed someone to take care of the sugarcane crops.”
Similar to the Sugar Land 95 discovery five years ago— it’s believed by some activists the land also was a burial site for those imprisoned. The land was bought by the Fort Bend Independent School District in June.
“The news announcement for this school contained no information that this school was located on a prison farm or that it was also near a cemetery where we don’t know where it is,” Jay Jenkins, president and co-founder of The Convict Leasing and Labor Project, said.
KPRC 2 reached out to the district. They responded saying the developers have done an archaeological survey of the area— including digging. A spokesperson also said though it appears unlikely, if remains are discovered, they will be handled with the utmost dignity and respect, including memorialization.
“It’s very scary to think what else might be happening relating to some of these land purchases,” Jenkins said.
A spokesperson also said the site was chosen because of the need for a school in the area— saying it’s difficult to find a piece of land large enough to accommodate the needs of a school.