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Oh, I think people are more than willing to talk aboout it--with plenty of hyperbole on both sides of the discussion.
I'm going to pose an honest question here:
During the 1950s and 1960s, many neighborhoods in DC transitioned from majority white to majority black, as many whites (and upper-class African-Americans) began moving out of the city. With this exodus came the closing of many businesses that had existed those neighborhoods, and a commensurate rise in crime and urban blight. By the 1980s, DC had become a city plagued by high crime, drug violence, and many neighborhoods suffering from neglect and urban decay. The city's leadership had become so inept that control of the city reverted to the Financial Control Board.
My question is: would you feel as passionately about this marked time of transition and change in DC as you apparently do with regards to what is going on in the city now?
It sounds very nice and empathetic to say things like "Revitalization? What a crock of *****," but a closer inspection reveals a bit more nuance than you're giving to the situation. "Revitalization" means more than new condo buildings and expensive eateries. It also means more accountability from city leadership, better amenities in all neighborhoods throughout the city, safer streets, more and better parks, libraries and rec centers, improved city services, more and better transit options, and so on. These are things that benefit *all* residents of the city, whether or not they can afford a penthouse in Langston Lofts.
Gentrification and revitalization are not a single-sided coin, and it's a false choice to examine only the perceived negatives of the process and pronounce the city's revitalization as uniformly bad.
Don't forget the riots they were the big catalyst of flight out of the city.
DC people pump up U Street the same way they pump up Taraji P. Henson and Wale. Taraji is a decent actress, but she's no Julia Roberts. Wale is an okay rapper, but he's no Jay-Z. U Street has a lot of history, but it's no 125th Street.
Harlem inspired Pan-Africanism and Negritude. It was where Zora Neale Hurston wrote "Their Eyes Were Watching God." It was where Jacob Lawrence created his best works. It was where Marcus Garvey started a movement. U Street, on the other hand, was where a few notable artists and musicians passed through every now and again. It's really more comparable to "Sweet" Auburn Avenue in Atlanta
I've never heard of Taraji and I couldn't name a single Wale song, but I think you're greatly short-changing the historical importance of U Street here--it was certainly more than just a place where some artists and musicians passed through. U Street was tremendously important in the context of African-American culture from the 1910s through the late 50s, and was actually in front of Harlem through the 1920s. Harlem eventually eclipsed it, but that's largely due to the fact that New York as a whole at that time was cementing itself as the country's corporate and cultural epicenter. But consider the immense impact the graduates and faculty of Howard University have had, or the civil rights leaders and activists that populated Shaw and LeDroit Park. Hell, two doors down from us is the former residence of the first African-American Rhodes Scholar, Alain Locke. Our own nondescript building was the site of a meeting of prominent civil rights leaders in the late 1910s.
The problem with U Street's history and heritage is that it got buried beneath the riots and crumbling infrastructure of DC. Harlem was in New York and had the Apollo, Malcolm X and the full weight of NYC's cultural superiority behind it. U Street became more famous for the 1968 race riots than for the fact that it had at one time the nation's greatest concentration of A-A lawyers, doctors and professors. All of which is to say nothing about U Street's artistic and cultural impact.
Sure, Harlem became bigger, brasher and iconic, while U Street festered. But my goodness, U Street in its heyday could more than hold its own. Check out Blair Ruble's biography of U Street, which is probably the definitive historical account of the street and its historical and cultural impact. (Seriously, check it out. It's a great read, and tremendously fascinating.) It was certainly much more than simply a place where some notable people passed through on their way to bigger and better things.
I've never heard of Taraji and I couldn't name a single Wale song, but I think you're greatly short-changing the historical importance of U Street here--it was certainly more than just a place where some artists and musicians passed through. U Street was tremendously important in the context of African-American culture from the 1910s through the late 50s, and was actually in front of Harlem through the 1920s. Harlem eventually eclipsed it, but that's largely due to the fact that New York as a whole at that time was cementing itself as the country's corporate and cultural epicenter. But consider the immense impact the graduates and faculty of Howard University have had, or the civil rights leaders and activists that populated Shaw and LeDroit Park. Hell, two doors down from us is the former residence of the first African-American Rhodes Scholar, Alain Locke. Our own nondescript building was the site of a meeting of prominent civil rights leaders in the late 1910s.
The problem with U Street's history and heritage is that it got buried beneath the riots and crumbling infrastructure of DC. Harlem was in New York and had the Apollo, Malcolm X and the full weight of NYC's cultural superiority behind it. U Street became more famous for the 1968 race riots than for the fact that it had at one time the nation's greatest concentration of A-A lawyers, doctors and professors. All of which is to say nothing about U Street's artistic and cultural impact.
Sure, Harlem became bigger, brasher and iconic, while U Street festered. But my goodness, U Street in its heyday could more than hold its own. Check out Blair Ruble's biography of U Street, which is probably the definitive historical account of the street and its historical and cultural impact. (Seriously, check it out. It's a great read, and tremendously fascinating.) It was certainly much more than simply a place where some notable people passed through on their way to bigger and better things.
I hear you, but so many cities have a rich African American heritage. That's not the same as having a broad impact on black culture. For a long time, Fisk University in Nashville was home to the top black scholars in the nation, and it was actually the first black college to have a chapter of Phi Beta Kappa. Morehouse and Spelman in Atlanta certainly equal Howard's contributions (Morehouse did produce Dr. Martin Luther King after all; Marian Wright Edelman and Alice Walker are products of Spelman). And Philadelphia and Chicago both have longstanding black communities. So does Durham, North Carolina. And Tulsa, Oklahoma (of all places, right?) had a thriving black community until the 1930s when it was destroyed by race rioters.
None of these places had a widespread impact on black culture, though. It has always been Harlem. Aime Cesaire, Franz Fanon, Leopold Senghor, Paulette Nardal and Leon Damas all said they were influenced by the Harlem Renaissance and inspired by its political energy. Nobody says that about U Street. Having a rich black heritage is not the same as inspiring black art, literature, music, and political movements. Harlem stands alone in that regard.
I don't consider Philly to be a great bastion of black culture (not like Harlem anyway). But did you know that Alain Locke attended my high school? Jeremiah Wright grew up in my neighborhood and Bobby Seale currently resides there. Marian Anderson was a Philly girl. So is Elaine Brown, the famous Black Panther. The house I grew up in was used to house runaway slaves who had escaped from the South (from Maryland mostly). Paul Robeson lived in the neighborhood, too. Still, I don't consider Philadelphia to be that influential with respect to black culture. Sure, some notable figures were born there, lived there, and made names for themselves there, but it's not like there was a movement in Philadelphia that was anything like the Harlem Renaissance. The same goes for DC, Detroit, Chicago, Atlanta, Nashville and Durham. What happened on U Street that catapulted it above, say, Auburn Avenue in Atlanta?
Last edited by BajanYankee; 05-20-2011 at 08:10 AM..
lol are you kidding? please do the actual research on U Street. It was a lot bigger than just a "few notable artists and musicians passing through". Many of the intellectual heavyweights in the African American community were there before Harlem became Harlem. Thurgood Marshall, Charles Drew, etc. The first YMCA for African Americans was built there. You're talking the biggest AA community in the country during the early 1900s.
lol are you kidding? please do the actual research on U Street. It was a lot bigger than just a "few notable artists and musicians passing through". Many of the intellectual heavyweights in the African American community were there before Harlem became Harlem. Thurgood Marshall, Charles Drew, etc. The first YMCA for African Americans was built there. You're talking the biggest AA community in the country during the early 1900s.
How do you know I haven't done the "actual research on U Street?" Have you done the "actual research" on N.C. Mutual Life Insurance and the black community in Durham? Have you read John Hope Franklin's The Negro in Twentieth Century America? Have you researched the history of Roxbury, Massachusetts? Or Atlanta? DC was not the only place that had a concentration of black professionals prior to the Harlem Renaissance, and to even suggest that it could possibly hold a candle to Harlem is one of the more ridiculously outrageous notions I've come across on this board.
There's a reason why textbooks talk about Harlem but not U Street. It's the same reason they don't talk about Auburn Avenue, or Germantown Avenue, or any other place in America that had minimal if any impact on black culture as a whole.
And really, if we're going to put U Street on Harlem's level because of Alain Locke (who hailed from Philadelphia) and Howard, then we have to put Nashville on the same level too because of W.E.B. Du Bois and Fisk. Was there really a bigger black "intellectual heavyweight" than W.E.B. Du Bois?
Last edited by BajanYankee; 05-20-2011 at 08:35 AM..
And really, if we're going to put U Street on Harlem's level because of Alain Locke (who hailed from Philadelphia) and Howard, then we have to put Nashville on the same level too because of W.E.B. Du Bois and Fisk. Was there really a bigger black "intellectual heavyweight" than W.E.B. Du Bois?
I mentioned Alain locke because his house is on my street, not to hold him up as the shining beacon of U Street's heyday.
If you think I'm positioning U Street as larger or more important than Harlem, I'm not. I'll give you that Harlem does stand alone in terms of it's preeminence and impact on A-A life and culture in the U.S. U Street was the nation's largest A-A community through the 1920s, but as I noted in my post above it was eventually eclipsed by Harlem and never fully recovered.
My response was directed towards your comment that U Street was little more than a place where a few artists and musicians happened to spend some time. Perhaps you were simply being hyperbolic, but that statement is just tremendously off the mark. The more I have learned about individuals such as Anna Cooper, Carter Woodson, Mary McLeod Bethune, Charles Hamilton Houston and Mary Church Terrell, the more impressed I am by the astounding concentration of intellectuals, activitists and artists in and around U Street during the first half of the 20th century. It was certainly much more than a place where Duke Ellington cut his chops and Cab Calloway performed at the Howard.
My response was directed towards your comment that U Street was little more than a place where a few artists and musicians happened to spend some time. Perhaps you were simply being hyperbolic, but that statement is just tremendously off the mark. The more I have learned about individuals such as Anna Cooper, Carter Woodson, Mary McLeod Bethune, Charles Hamilton Houston and Mary Church Terrell, the more impressed I am by the astounding concentration of intellectuals, activitists and artists in and around U Street during the first half of the 20th century. It was certainly much more than a place where Duke Ellington cut his chops and Cab Calloway performed at the Howard.
I understand your point. My point is that U Street did not have more of an impact on black culture than any other place. In fact, it's impact on black culture is not even discernible. You can easily identify Harlem as being the origins of Pan-Africanism and Negritude. That's having an impact on black culture.
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