HOUSTON — In 1953, Ebony magazine reported there were 3,000 black-owned funeral parlors across the country, and last year, that number had decreased to about 1,200, with nearly a dozen remaining across the Houston area.
In an effort to keep everyone safe, funeral directors have had to implement strict new procedures for services and burials.
“This thing is truly serious,” said Houston funeral director Otis Wiley, of O.W. Wiley Mortuary in Acreage Home.
“When we walked into a hospital to collect our first body and saw so many patients on the ventilators, when we got back to the funeral home, it was an emotional time,” he said.
I really think we were one of the first African American funeral homes to deal with the COVID virus because out of the first three cases that came from Houston, one of those cases came to us.
