Black nature enthusiasts are reclaiming landscape for all, reigniting a love of outdoors

Thurman Hogan learned to love the outdoors at an early age. One of his earliest memories involves helping his grandmother in her garden in Tatums, Okla., a town settled by freed people in 1859.
At her house, Hogan would pretend to rough it in the Great Outdoors. Other times, he chased chickens across the neighborhood. When the sun went down, he’d stay indoors watching nature documentaries.
“Black people have always been outside,” Hogan said. But he said a long history of racism led many to believe it “isn’t Black” to embrace outdoor pursuits like fishing, swimming, diving, hiking or camping.
Now Hogan, who lives in San Antonio and whose family has ties to Fort Worth, is part of a growing cohort dedicated to reclaiming the landscape and igniting Black people’s love of outdoor recreation.
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Hogan attended Trinity University in San Antonio for business administration with a concentration in marketing. Through a mutual friend, he met Alex Bailey, the founder of Black Outside, a San Antonio-based nonprofit dedicated to reconnecting young people of color to the outdoors.
Hogan said working for the nonprofit allowed him to turn his passion for the outdoors into a career. “We get all kinds of kids from all different walks of life,” said Hogan, who serves as Black Outside’s director of operations. “At the end of the day, it’s meeting them where they are and basically adapting to their [comfort] level.”
Black Outside members have led camping trips across Texas and have also gone backpacking in Denver, according to Hogan.
But barriers remain. Jim Crow-era “separate but equal” laws extended beyond public transportation and buildings. The laws segregated beaches, swimming pools and even national park entrances. Designated areas for recreation were also subject to racist attacks and poor facilities, according to the National Park Service. Several Dallas parks have histories that reflect this legacy, according to a 2016 Dallas Morning News report.
People of color still lack access to parks and outdoor spaces, and they’re still often lacking in quality, according to a study in the Journal of Park and Recreation Administration.
In May, the results of a self-reported survey on swimming skills, lessons and water recreation were released as part of the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, a series by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
According to the report, a lack of access and “complex social and cultural factors” are among the reasons why many people of color don’t know how to swim. The CDC reported that across all adults, 45% had taken swimming lessons. However, only 37% of Black adults said they’ve taken swimming lessons in their lifetime.
Jimmie Mack, 73, has a great love not just for the outdoors, but for open water. She is a scuba diver and former captain in the Army. She lives in Dallas, but she was born in Temple and grew up in Houston. Mack wanted to be an oceanographer in high school but studied physical education and biology at Tennessee State University.
During her last year of college, she planned to enlist in the Navy, but when she learned she wasn’t going to start for another six months, she enlisted in the Army. She served in the military for 21 years.
While she was stationed in Hawaii, she received her diving certificate. She has been diving in places like Egypt, Indonesia, Fiji and Belize. Scuba diving helped her to get into underwater photography.
But there were moments when she was the only person of color on her trips. And scuba divers often dive with partners.
“When you’re the only ‘colorful’ person… they don’t want to dive with you,” Mack said. She recalled a time when her assigned partner seemed hesitant to collaborate with her before diving. Then when they were in the water, Mack’s partner left her and returned to the boat.
This encouraged Mack to become a better diver. Not only so she could dive by herself and not have to rely on others, but so she could teach other people of color, especially younger people, to enjoy scuba diving.
Mack has worked with organizations like the National Association of Black Scuba Divers and Diving with a Purpose. She’s worked with younger divers, sometimes using her photos to make calendars for fundraising events.
Mack hopes that more parents of color can be open-minded and get over their fear of swimming and open water. She said these attitudes can limit the opportunities their children can have. She said even a summer job at a dive shop can go a long way in exposing them to different experiences and careers.
Like Black Outside, Outdoor Afro encourages people of color to discover the joys of nature.
Helena Banks, who grew up in Oak Cliff, wasn’t an outdoorsy kid growing up. But she now leads the D-FW chapter of Outdoor Afro, a national nonprofit started in California in 2009.
During the summer, her mom would send a young Helena to Atlanta to visit her aunt and cousin. While there, she would go to summer camp, where she first experienced camping in a cabin. She recalls wanting to swim, while her cousin was petrified.
Even as a college student, Banks recalls camping with other Black students. She says that instead of camping like they saw people do on TV, they decided to bring the ingredients for a fish fry and champagne and camped “the way they wanted.” It was then that she began to enjoy the outdoors.
Years later, she earned a certificate in scuba diving at Dallas College Eastfield Campus. This led her to find other Black diver organizations like the Black Coral Divers, the National Association of Black Scuba Divers and people like Jimmie Mack.
Banks also realized she had a personal connection to diving. During a trip to the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C., she saw an exhibit on Diving with a Purpose, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving and conserving the submerged heritage with a focus on the African Diaspora.
The organization is involved in efforts to search for and document shipwrecks associated with the transatlantic slave trade, like the Clotilda shipwreck off the coast of Alabama. “I was just dumbfounded, because my maternal family was all based in Alabama… I can connect my heritage and my hobby,” said Banks.
Tiara Chapman has also worked with Outdoor Afro as a volunteer leader. She led hikes and other activities for seven years, but now lives and works in San Antonio.
Chapman was originally studying criminal justice and sociology at Augusta State University (now Augusta University) in Georgia. She eventually wanted to become a U.S. Marshal and was going to graduate in three months. But after Chapman met a woman on death row, she said she had an existential crisis.
Then she saw a documentary about a U.S. Park Ranger who was Black. Chapman said she didn’t realize it was an option. She wanted to become one herself.
After she graduated from Augusta State, she joined a program offered by the National Park Service called ProRanger that had an internship program at San Antonio College. Chapman said she then spent nearly 10 years working at state and national parks, including parks in both Alaska and Texas.
When Chapman became a volunteer leader for Outdoor Afro in San Antonio and then in Dallas, she led hikes with people at all levels of experience.
“The one thing everybody had in common is that they wanted to go outside but didn’t feel safe doing so,” Chapman said.
To make people feel comfortable, Chapman often had to research areas and establish relationships with park staff members ahead of time. She said she never felt threatened. But there were times when groups she was leading felt closely watched by both other park guests and staff. Chapman said it made some diversity efforts to bring more people of color into parks feel inauthentic.
But Chapman said she had positive moments. She said Black people who were once hesitant to join hikes and activities would come back. She stressed that Black people looking to get into outdoor recreation can start with their local parks. They don’t need to be experts. She said going on a walk close to home can be just as impactful as hiking in the Grand Tetons.
Researching areas beforehand also allowed Chapman to learn about the histories of the areas she visited. She learned about other Black people who helped people experience the natural world.
During a visit to Yosemite National Park, she recalled feeling the spray from Bridalveil Fall, a waterfall in the park. She imagined what it must have been like for the first Black Park Rangers to experience the area.
Hogan, of Black Outside, echoed Chapman’s feelings. “Did we lose that connection (to the outdoors)?” he asked. “Yes. But that connection has always been there and it’s always been inherent inside of us.”
Jordan Chapman reports on science for The Dallas Morning News as part of a fellowship with the American Association for the Advancement of Science.