Mariah Rocker talks  Saturday morning about historical Black citizens that are recognized at the Jacksonville Cemetery.

Jacksonville may be best known for its Gold Rush era, notable pioneer photographer Peter Britt and its 19th-century Chinese Quarter, but few know of the town’s Black pioneers and African-American community within the Applegate Valley in the 1800s.

Highlighting that seldom-heard history with the Black History Walking Tour of Jacksonville, statewide African American historical society Oregon Black Pioneers put on its first-ever walking tour Saturday in Southern Oregon.

“When you’re in a beautiful, preserved, historic town like Jacksonville, and you can say there were Black people who lived and worked and owned land here, it’s an exciting way to get people into that history,” said Mariah Rocker, walking tour guide and public programs and exhibits manager for Oregon Black Pioneers.

“We will go over some of the people that were actually buried here in the potter’s field and mentioned here on this tombstone, and we also will talk about some more local figures of Jackson County in general.”

Standing in the historic Jacksonville Cemetery, Rocker discussed the significance of sharing and continuing to uncover Black history in Oregon, and the stories of some of the state’s earliest settlers.

“I just find them to be incredibly impactful and powerful, and with such a small percentage of the state being Black people, it’s really important to highlight these stories,” Rocker said. “It’s really important to highlight that fact that they were not only here, but making lives and helping to build the community.”

The two-hour tour involved eight stops at gravestones and points of significance around Jacksonville, starting at the 30-acre cemetery and ending at the Jackson Creek Junction Gazebo.

Some of the notable African American residents in Jacksonville and Southern Oregon covered in the tour included Samuel Vose, Ben Johnson, Charles Blockwell and more, with each person holding a significant role in Jacksonville’s Black community in the mid-1800s.

“Samuel Vose, I would say, was pretty influential in town; he actually seemed to have been a town crier, so he was running around town and everyone knew of him and was familiar with him,” Rocker said. “He was well-known and really a part of the community, and also a landowner and a business owner.”

With the Black History Walking Tour of Jacksonville selling out, many of the 35-plus attendees were thrilled to learn and hear more about Jacksonville’s notable Black pioneers and early settlers.

“I’m familiar with some of the Black history here in Southern Oregon, and it was really exciting to hear that this event was coming up and just days away and just down the road,” said Sharif Abdulrahman, visiting from Grants Pass. “Hearing Black history that’s seldom covered in this area, that’s the whole point of being out here.”

“My purpose, personally, is just understanding,” said Rosalie Wolff, visiting with friends from the Rogue Valley Unitarian Universalist Fellowship. “I know Oregon has a really bad history related to how they’ve treated and legislated against Black people in this area, so I think this is really import for me to find out.”

During the westward expansion period of United States history, Oregon lawmakers passed a variety of discriminatory measures including multiple Black exclusion laws, punishing African Americans who tried to settle in the state.

“It’s really important to uncover these stories and to share them just to demonstrate the tenacity and grit of these people coming to a place where there were Black exclusion laws, where there was clearly a goal of white utopia,” Rocker said.

“Nonetheless they stayed, and they built homes and lives here, and just doing that in and of itself was an act of resiliency.”

Another goal of Oregon Black Pioneers’ work and the walking tour is to break the stereotype of Oregon Trail settlers being solely white.

“It goes to dispel the perception of what the pioneers of the Oregon Trail really looked like, because 3% of travelers on the Oregon Trail were Black, and that’s definitely not what I imagined when I see that wagon trail in my mind,” Rocker said.

With the popularity and success of the walking tour, Oregon Black Pioneers plans to offer four new tours in 2024, targeting locations in Portland, Eugene, Salem, Jacksonville and other cities brimming with Black History.

Oregon Black Pioneers was formed in 1993 with the intention of highlighting and spreading the people, stories and communities in connection with Oregon’s Black history.

“We feel it’s important to understand the experiences of black Oregonians to understand Oregon’s history more broadly,” said executive director Zachary Stocks.

The organization provides exhibits, online resources, podcasts, interactive history maps and more to preserve and understand the history of Black Oregonians, Stocks added.

“Speaking their names and telling their stories honors them so much, and that’s a huge part of the work that we want to do,” Rocker said.

To learn more about Oregon Black Pioneers and the organization’s multiple online programs, visit oregonblackpioneers.org.