Lexington downtown park, once the site of slave market, to be renamed for Black leader
The city of Lexington plans to rename a popular downtown park that was once the site of a slave market after a freed slave and Black entrepreneur who helped build the former Fayette County courthouse.
Mayor Linda Gorton announced Friday the city’s park advisory board has signed off on the name change of Cheapside Park to the Henry A. Tandy Centennial Park. The Lexington-Fayette Urban County Council must approve the name change, and a vote is expected in August.
Tandy, a freed slave, moved to Lexington and joined Alfred Byrd to form the company Tandy & Byrd, which was a leading masonry contractor in Lexington. The company did the masonry work for the 1899 former Fayette County courthouse.
Tandy had several leadership roles in the community and was a founding member and trustee of the Seventh Day Adventist Church.
The move to rename Cheapside Park has been in the works for several months. But the reimagining of the park and the adjacent former Fayette County courthouse started in 2017, when the Urban County Council voted unanimously to move statues of Confederate Secretary of War John C. Breckinridge and Confederate general John Hunt Morgan from the courthouse lawn.
A historic marker, sponsored by Lexington Alumni Chapter of the Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, has been returned to the site. The marker details the Cheapside slave auction that was held on the site and the history of slavery in Fayette County. Cheapside Park on Main Street dates back to 1780, when the area was set aside as a public square for a market and a courthouse.
The area includes the Fifth Third Pavilion, which is one of the city’s prime gathering spots. It has hosted concerts, festivals and farmers markets.
“Renaming Cheapside Park in honor of one of Lexington’s most remarkable, successful Black entrepreneurs is important considering the history that has occurred in this space,” said Gorton. “The renaming of Cheapside Park helps bridge our past, present and future … we are looking ahead to a brighter future for Lexington over the next 100 years.”
Take Back Cheapside, a citizen-led group that pushed for the removal of the statutes, has worked with the city to rename the park.
“We know that the renaming of the space will not change the atrocities that happened in Cheapside or make it an inclusive place,” said Take Back Cheapside Co-Founder DeBraun Thomas. “It is however a much-needed step for the true healing and reconciliation that our community needs. Mr. Tandy’s legacy is tied directly to the bricks laid in the Old Courthouse and the road he paved for the success of others.”
It was while researching Cheapside Park, the former courthouse and the statues that Thomas first learned about Tandy and his contributions to Lexington.
If approved by the council in August as expected, Henry A. Tandy Centennial Park will join nine existing Lexington parks honoring Black Americans including: George Washington Carver, Charles Young, Frederick Douglass, Paul L. Dunbar, Isaac Murphy, Lou Johnson, Martin Luther King, Jr., Whitney Young and William Wells Brown.
