Rev. John Henry "Jack" Yates House 1870 (Black Land Owner)

The Jack Yates House stood at 1318 Andrews (Freedman's Town) since 1870 and was moved to Sam Houston Park in 1994. Five years after the Civil War and being freed, Jack was the city's first African-American property owner. Jack was born in 1828. He learned to read and write as a child on a Virginia plantation, in Gloucester County,Virginia in about 1863. He moved to Texas when his wife's owner relocated to Matagorda County,Texas. He moved to Houston in 1866. He was ordained and was Rev. of the Antioch Baptist Church. He started the way to the making of TSU. Yates died in his home in 1897 at the age of 69. He is buried in the College Park Cemetery.