Historic Old Oak Cliff

What You Don't Know About Oak Cliff (And Should) by John Merwin 

[In Oak Cliff] there are really…some of the most beautiful neighborhoods in Dallas. The most stunning of these is the Kessler Park-Stevens Park area in north Oak Cliff, nudged up against the Dallas-Fort Worth Turnpike. Many of the area's homes are the equal of those in Highland Park, and often sell for half the price of a Highland Park home…. North Oak Cliff is also prettier than the Park Cities - the area is built on a series of cuestas - huge beds of rock protruding out of the ground at an angle, forming hills with gentle slopes on one side and steep cliffs on the other. [An]other stunning neighborhood, Wynnewood Hills, surrounds the Oak Cliff Country Club.

 

Although other formerly independent cities such as East Dallas and West Dallas have merged smoothly into Dallas, Oak Cliff has not. Even though Oak Cliff residents voted to join the City of Dallas in 1904, Oak Cliff still bears signs, both physical and spiritual, that it remains a city unto itself.

The basic cause of Oak Cliffs independence is the Trinity. Although many areas of Oak Cliff are actually closer to downtown than are parts of North Dallas, Oak Cliff seems more distant because to get to them, you must cross the river an act which constantly reminds us that Oak Cliff is on the other side. There's another aspect of crossing the river that implies a dramatic change. With the exception of R.L. Thornton Freeway and Corinth Street, every street flowing from Dallas west across the Trinity changes its name. Houston becomes Zang, Commerce changes into Fort Worth Avenue, Continental into Singleton, Wycliff into Sylvan and Inwood into Hampton. (Several of these actually cross into West Dallas, which is also west of the Trinity, and by some is mistakenly considered a part of Oak Cliff.) Once you arrive in Oak Cliff more differences become apparent. In the heart of Oak Cliff, there art streets named 8th Street, 10th Street and so on, a numbering system which implies that Oak Cliff really is a separate city.

Dallas also won the population race, which began on both sides of the river in the early 1840s. For some reason growth on the Dallas side exceeded that in Oak Cliff both in quality and in quantity. The most interesting development west of the Trinity occurred in the 1850s when a group of several hundred Europeans, mostly French, founded a Utopian colony in what now is West Dallas. It was named La Reunion, but collapsed within a few years. Afterward many of the immigrant artisans crossed the river and settled in Dallas. Local historian A.C. Greene credits the settlers of La Reunion with giving Dallas a cultural breadth it might not have acquired for decades without the Frenchmen's influence.

Oak Cliff's first ambitious development was laid out in the 1890s by T.L. Marsalis and J.S. Armstrong, the men who probably popularized the name "Oak Cliff." (For 50 years the area had been known as Hord's Ridge, named for a local landowner.) Marsalis and Armstrong split soon after the development opened. Ultimately Marsalis failed in his Oak Cliff venture while Armstrong later succeeded with his sons-in-law in developing Highland Park. Prestigious developments like Highland Park, University Park and Munger Place grew on North Dallas' waxy blackland prairie while Oak Cliff struggled along on a beautifully hilly tern in across the Trinity, an obstacle which wasn't permanently spanned until the Houston Street Viaduct opened in 1912, forever linking Oak Cliff and Dallas.
The chalky bluff which rises out of the Trinity River bottom suggests something about one-third of our city. Oak Cliff, population 300,000. Oak Cliff stands boldly in a defensive position, like a bastion atop a bluff, peering out across the Trinity flood plain at Dallas. Although a half-dozen bridges link Oak Cliff to Dallas, tying us together as one city, Oak Cliff is still "over there," across the river. The bridges serve as landmarks straddling the chasm which separates us, but in many ways the chasm is far more important. It marks a fundamental breach, one that has led "us" in Dallas to talk about "them" in Oak Cliff. Although corporately we are one. spiritually we are not.

Most east-of-the-river Dallasites have forgotten that but for a few votes Oak Cliff might have been looking down its nose at Dallas for the last 127 years. In 1850 the independent settlements of Dallas, Oak Cliff, and Cedar Springs vied for the official seat of Dallas County. Dallas received 181 votes, Oak Cliff 178 votes, while Cedar Springs (where Lemmon and the North Tollway now intersect) garnered 101 votes. In the run-off election Dallas prevailed over Oak Cliff, 244 to 216. To the victor went the spoils. Dallas won the county courthouse and has been winning ever since, seizing practically all of the goodies for its side of the river, keeping Oak Cliff residents constantly looking north and east to Dallas.

No matter what happens, it is unlikely that Oak Cliff will ever fade into the background of Dallas. It is too big, too old and too proud to bow to Dallas, the state's second largest city. Oak Cliff, after all, is Texas' sixth largest city. Whoever heard of a city that size fading away?

Excerpts copied from dmagazine.com: D Magazine APRIL 1977, Posted On: 4/1/1977