Long overlooked and plagued by safety concerns, the MLK DART Station has seen little of the investment poured into nearby Fair Park. Now, three commercial property owners — two Black, all local families — control 27 acres around the station. They have benefitted from a grassroots business coalition led by Hank Lawson and believe transit-oriented development could revive local businesses and draw long-overdue attention to South Dallas — even after a recent proposal fell through.

Historians and journalists have documented — and today’s staffers recognize — the State Fair of Texas’ racist history. In the early 1900s the fair hosted one “Colored People Day” per year. It was discontinued in 1910.  On a Wednesday in fall 1923, Ku Klux Klan Day drew some 160,000 Klansmen to the fairgrounds for the initiation of the “largest class in the history of Klandom,” according to the flier, which included an application for membership on the back.  Negro Achievement Day launched in 1936. Each year on Oct. 14, Black fairgoers were admitted inside the gates. 

It’s a tragic irony that the largest agriculture promoter in the state, the State Fair of Texas, is surrounded by a food desert, the neighborhood of South Dallas.