Oak Ridge Cemetery

Oak Ridge Cemetery was formally established in 1851 when the Macon City Council designated land in Rose Hill Cemetery specifically for African-American burials. As a municipal cemetery, burial records exist for Oak Ridge and document at least 960 burials of both enslaved and free people of color prior to the Civil War, many of which are now unmarked. A portion of the cemetery was sold in 1879 to serve as a burial place for the Temple Beth Israel congregation. The inclusion of "Strangers Row" for paupers in the 1890s illustrates a shift in interments. In the twentieth century, Oak Ridge provided burial space for Macon's growing African-American business class. Individuals interred here include Hannibal Roe, "a free man of color" buried in 1846 in a now-unmarked grave, and Professor H.J.T. Hudson, namesake of Ballard-Hudson High School.