Before a Farmers Market Fight, Some Old Photos of What They're Fighting Over
The Dallas Farmers Market Friends will be at tonight's Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs meeting, to speak out against a plan to open transitional housing for homeless people near the market. 
Courtesy Dallas Municipal Archives, City Secretary's Office Dallas Farmers Market, unknown date.
In their pleas to save the place, board members have made many references to the history of the market. I asked Justin Collins, who serves on the board, to tell me more about that history, and he set me up with Margie Jackson Haley, whose great grandfather A.A. Jackson was, at least in part, responsible for the original Pearl Street Market.
Margie told me A. A. Jackson was a farmer. He came to Dallas in 1878 and became a wholesale produce guy, because there weren't many grocery stores around at that time. In 1896 Jackson was elected Alderman, and during his term he helped pass a bill to get the city to build the original Pearl Street Market.
The photo above and the ones below obviously came long after Jackson's work, but they provide some context for where the market was before it became a problem for City Hall. If you've got a vested interest in the market, make sure you hit tonight's meeting. It's at 6 p.m. at the J. Erik Jonsson Central Library (Commerce & Ervay).
Courtesy Dallas Municipal Archives, City Secretary's Office Those look like some massive old-school sweet potatoes.
Courtesy Dallas Municipal Archives, City Secretary's Office 1940s photograph of parked cars in front of Dallas Farmers Market
Courtesy Dallas Municipal Archives, City Secretary's Office Photograph of pecan seller's storefront, 1959
Courtesy Dallas Municipal Archives, City Secretary's Office Circa 1980s verified via mullet.
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