Subdivisions Built for Blacks Preserved
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COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP)—Young, working-class and black, Henry Bolden Jr. was not the kind of person who bought a new house in 1946, even in the North. But Bolden was also a U.S. Army veteran who’d spent World War II driving supply trucks in Belgium and France. With help from the GI Bill, he was able to buy his house in a Columbus neighborhood that was revolutionary in its day: Hanford Village, an enclave of single-family homes marketed solely to blacks.
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Some of the early black homeowner neighborhoods around the country are trying to win historic recognition before their place in the history of homeownership fades.
The residents want to be listed on the National Register of Historic Places, which would make them eligible for federal tax credits or grants for historic preservation. The designation doesn’t protect against demolition but requires anyone involved with a federally funded project, including developers, to take the listing into consideration when the work could endanger the structure.
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The neighborhoods were developed as the G.I. Bill made home ownership a reality for millions for the first time, including blacks. Cities partnered with the government—the Veterans Administration or the Federal Housing Authority—and private developers with a conscience.
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Another challenge is the relative youth of the housing developments. Eligibility for the National Register begins after 50 years, a timespan that could now make “historic places” of split-level ranch subdivisions and shopping plazas.
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The National Register, a listing of about 80,000 properties, considers the architectural and historic importance of buildings and the shape they’re in.
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In Columbus, the Hanford Village subdivision got its start in 1946 when real estate developer Ivan Gore advertised the first houses.
“Homes for Negro Families” read the April 21 ad that year in The Columbus Dispatch. Houses were available for about $6,500, a relative bargain considering the median value of a single-family home at the time was about $8,500.
William Watkins was a Tuskegee Airman who lived in one of the first houses while stationed at nearby Lockborne Air Force Base. Watkins, now 94, remembered how happy he was to have a house as a newly married soldier.
There was gratitude, but something less comfortable too: The segregated houses were a reminder of blacks’ station in society, even in a northern city.
“There was always a bitter spot in our hearts because they’re building houses all over Columbus and the only houses available for Afro-American vets was this one little Hanford Village,” Watkins said. “This is only a drop in the bucket of the number of houses that we actually need.”
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Children rode their bikes late into the night. They fished, swam and rafted in nearby Alum Creek. Families played and picnicked in the park around the corner.
A mom calling her son home could yell his name from her door and neighbors would repeat it house after house until the message arrived.
“Everybody knew each other, everybody’s parents parented everybody,” said Carol Haile, whose father, Major Haile, an aircraft mechanic who served in the Pacific in World War II, bought one of the first houses.
The neighborhood began to change in the 1960s when the state routed Interstate 70 through Hanford Village, removing several houses. The highway split the park that a generation of children had grown up in, rendering the remaining few acres almost inaccessible.
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Today, Hanford Village is slightly downtrodden, with a mix of renters and homeowners, including a few original residents. Many of the single-story Cape Cod-style cottages are still well kept, looking more or less the same as when they were built. Others are showing signs of neglect; some are even boarded-up.
The Ohio Historical Society considers Hanford Village historically significant and deserving of further study. But it will take a resident to step forward and ask for the process of listing on the National Register to begin.
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(Posted on February 12, 2008)
Comments
“The neighborhood began to change in the 1960s when the state routed Interstate 70 through Hanford Village, removing several houses. The highway split the park that a generation of children had grown up in, rendering the remaining few acres almost inaccessible.”
I was waiting for the crack epidemic to be blamed on the evils of this I-70. Instead, the next sentence in the article, all by itself, reads, “People began to move away.”
This is all just great. Now, evidence of discrimination against whites is turned into a “Historic Place”.
Once again, society discriminates in favor of blacks, and blacks are very angry about it.
Posted by LHathaway at 7:14 PM on February 12
Ahhhhh not to worry…in about one or two more years…it will look like Detroit…
Posted by lydia at 7:18 PM on February 12
Golly, I wish we could have a couple of “our” neighborhoods back that Africans ruined.
Would this then make them eligible for federal tax credits or grants for historic preservation once the pillaging of the past four decades is over?
Posted by Annoyed In Illinois at 7:35 PM on February 12
“The neighborhood began to change in the 1960s when the state routed Interstate 70 through Hanford Village, removing several houses.”
I daresay the neighborhood started to change because of the breakup of the family, compliments of LBJ and other feel good liberals of the day. The “gubmint” became “baby’s daddy” and there went the neighborhood.
Posted by at 8:04 PM on February 12
“Today, Hanford Village is slightly downtrodden, with a mix of renters and homeowners, including a few original residents.”
************ *********
I haven’t been there, but I’ll bet it’s more than “slightly downtrodden.” I’ll bet it’s an ugly shambles that normal people avoid.
Posted by at 8:37 PM on February 12
Well whites had their segregation areas and were not expected to go into black areas, so do these become historic places if whites decide they also want to spend the rest of their natural lives not being productive but wallowing in self-pity? I take it it’s self-pity they’re pushing.
Of course, any rational, historically minded person would point out that these segregation areas should serve as remembrances of black America’s heydey: minimum crime, drug abuse and illigitimacy, a dignified day’s work and church on sunday. Yes, there’s something worth celebrating.
Posted by at 8:48 PM on February 12
Maybe they could raise one those African Nationalist flags over the Southside of Chicago to commemorate the taking of white-held territory.
Posted by at 10:09 PM on February 12
Why is it that a longtime all-black community, however rundown, has a tendency to take on “historic” significance? Try to imagine a “historic” white district. By the way, didn’t that Kirkwood, Mo. mass murderer come from an all-black neighborhood incorporated by the City of Kirkwood? That sure worked out well, didn’t it?
Posted by Seeker at 11:24 PM on February 12
My Grandfather got his house through a GI bill, following WWII, as did many of his White neighbors. Of course, since the neighborhood was a white one, they were not allowed to declare it historic, or preserve it for others Whites.
Posted by at 11:31 PM on February 12
Well what do you know - yet another not-so-creative way for Blacks to openly self-segregate, even as they demand “equality” and “inclusion” in all things! American Blacks are absolutely shameless in their near-pathological hypocrisy. Of course, their shamelessness is surpassed only by the cowardice of Whites who allow these people to walk all over us whenever and wherever they like.
Posted by HH at 11:51 PM on February 12
Blacks are automatically given ” tax credits ” by their lack of earning power by being non-creative and mostly non-academic; that puts them in a much lower tax bracket all of the time since taxes have been collected here in America.They are always looking for ways to even reduce the little amount of taxes that they do produce by working for ” whitey or his government “; that is very ” racist and anti-white ” to me.
Posted by Michigan patriot at 8:18 AM on February 13
“… everybody’s parents parented eachother.” Which is exactly how Blacks live — a village-like mentality as chillin’ go home to home. I’m not saying it’s right or wrong but it’s fact.
And Mom calling for her kid and neighbors yelling it door to door. Nice! The youth “riding their bikes late into the night” is also true. Too bad they don’t believe in curfew or adult-time versus child-time. They’re all bunched together with no boundaries.
Posted by at 8:21 AM on February 13
“Of course, their shamelessness is surpassed only by the cowardice of Whites who allow these people to walk all over us whenever and wherever they like.”
But what is the driving force behind that? Whenever you shut up “because you know whats good for you” at your Fortune 500 Diversity meeting, aren’t YOU the one that allows the blacks to “take the high ground?” Perhaps you need to teach your children assertiveness in a class run by non-family members outside the public school system.
Posted by at 9:30 AM on February 13
This is The Rule you need to know to understand this issue:
‘What is black must remain black. What is white must be made black’.
Once you know The Rule, these things make a kind of perverted sense.
Blacks can preserve their history, culture, social order, and communities. They can scream that ‘segregation is wrong’ until their brown skin turns blue but they can insist and get what they deny to everyone else because of The Rule:
‘What is black must remain black. What is white must be made black’.
Posted by sbuffalonative at 10:26 AM on February 13
“Once again, society discriminates in favor of blacks…”
Yeah, right… I guess you secretly wish you were black, huh? Then life would be sweeter? Better education, more job opportunities, less discrimination, nobody making you feel like an immigrant in a country you were born in, etc…
“Well whites had their segregation areas and were not expected to go into black areas, so do these become historic places if whites decide they also want to spend the rest of their natural lives not being productive but wallowing in self-pity? I take it it’s self-pity they’re pushing.
Of course, any rational, historically minded person would point out that these segregation areas should serve as remembrances of black America’s heydey”
Er… Whites were not segregated and treated like cattle, they were NOT forced into the backs of busses or disallowed to vote. Segregation was black America’s Heyday? From your point of view perhaps, but no people want to be segregated. Would you enslave yourself if it gave you better healthcare and guarenteed you stopped smoking and drinking? Nah me neither…
thank you for your attention
peace
Posted by at 10:34 AM on February 13
Actually I think some preservation of the early 50’s achitecture is a good thing. The Levit town buildings were certainly unique enough to merit some preservation and they seem more energy efficiant than later housing due to the universal lack of air conditioning.
Posted by pat at 10:54 AM on February 13
Do you notice how Africans glorify the results of segregation, without even understanding what that means?
Take these “Tuskegee Arimen” falbe. It was due to red-blooded honest All-American segregation that there even was an “all black” fighter group. Without this “evil racism”, they would not have existed, thus they exist ONLY due to the concept of segregation. Do we ever get a “thank you” from the Africans for this? Well, no.
Take Harlem back in the 30’s and 40’s. They still talk of it as some great Citadel on the Hill. The Apollo, the Cotton Club and on and on. How great is was. Well, it existed ONLY because of healthy racism and segregation.
Why were the Tuskegee Airmen so good, (and they were)? Because they were the best of the African recruits. They competed African against African. No quotas, no affirmative airman action, etc. No racism what-so-ever since they were ALL Africans.
No whites to put them down or harm their self esteem.
This is how it should be. Africans should not have to deal with us whites. But since the end of healthy and moral segregation, the better of the Africans have moved away from their own race and wanted to “be white”. Thus, this destroyed the African communities, culture and values. There was no dominant male elephants to control the young renegade male juvenile elephants.
Africans in America will NEVER have a healthy or sane community as long as we don’t have segregation. To save the black man, the black woman, the black child and the black family, we need forced segregation. Without it, the Africans is doomed to a hell on earth and will hate us whites for it.
Read in the article how they loved the all black development. Children played and laughed and there were actually BLACK FAMILIES and there doesn’t appear to be any memory of drive by shootings, crip - vs - bloods, MS-13 moving in, gangsta rap, etc.
That proves my point. When blacks are FORCED to live amongst blacks and are PHYSICALLY kept away from whites, they thrive and they are happy.
Now, since this Hanford Village was a product of slavery, Jim Crow racism and white males hatered, why do they want to keep it?Isn’t this continueing the legacy of slavery? Would they not prefer having this blight removed? Oh, no. Let’s keep it to keep up the white guilt.
Posted by LOGIC at 12:12 PM on February 13
The only motivation behind this must lie in the fact that the neighborhood is STILL STANDING. It truly is an anomaly. By preserving this, they’re really saying “look, they’re not an ENTIRELY failed and worthless bunch.” Quaint but stupid.
Posted by Guillaume at 2:18 PM on February 13
“There was always a bitter spot in our hearts because they’re building houses all over Columbus and the only houses available for Afro-American vets was this one little Hanford Village,” Watkins said. “This is only a drop in the bucket of the number of houses that we actually need.”
This area of Columbus is now one of the worst neighborhoods in the city. If you were brave enough to drive down Livingston Ave. today you would find the usual diverse mix, gang bangers,groups of unemployed welfare recipients milling about,panhandlers, prostitutes, and the druggies. But they didn’t just stay in little Hanford Village, the entire south and east sides of the city are just as bad, including the nice little ‘burb that I grew up in. In the 60’s it was such a nice little place, small town, apple pie, cows and sheep, and nary a brother in site. Now it’s sprawl, hip hop and the bangers. Guess I got the bitter spot in my heart now, because I drive an hour to work every day, to those places, so my children can grow up with what I had. Forget about the west side, unless you hablo espanial. You know what Lydia, I bet it does look like Detroit. It’s ok folks, Obama is gonna bring us all together!
Posted by chickenman at 9:32 PM on February 13
They didn’t seem to interested in perserving Detroit, and it’s once famous architecture. Ah, but wait a minute! Detroit was once a White city, that eventually became Black. Perserving former, historic White neighborhoods is not the goal. The goal is diversity. But diversity is not a two-way street, it’s fine if an area switches from all White to all Black. It’s also fine if historic buildings and houses, built by White Americans wind up burned, looted, and crumbling in the process. But Black culture must be honored and perserved.
Posted by at 1:54 AM on February 14