Helping HAANDS

It was 2018 and I actually had never taken a trip for spring break. Almost two years out of undergrad, I missed some of the celebratory hallmarks in service to the grind. So a year in at my second "big boy" job, I took off.

I'm a Mobilian, Birminghamian, Kalamazooian and a Chicagoan. I-65ian for short.

I began my trek in Nashville, where I spent the afternoon in their civil rights library and driving Jefferson Street. There, I marinated (ha!) in Slim & Huskys. I missed the daylight appointment in Louisville but made it to Indianapolis, a hash mark for the Chi pilgrimage. I lunched at Kountry Kitchen and toured the Madame CJ Walker Theatre of Indiana Avenue.

A few months earlier, I jumped in the car and went to ATL. I was looking for new friends as a newbie to this preservationy-developy-thingy of a job-passion project I signed up for. My boss let me do it too.

"Ya'll have a strip? A Prince Hall Lodge Building Masonic Temple? A grimaced MLK bust? Public works fountain woes? 1910s era megachurches? Funeral homes giving life to the strip? Cuts for generations?"

BET.

Even a little bit earlier than that, at the 2017 People & Places Conference and the National Trust's Preservation Leadership Forum at the BCRI, I met Denise Gilmore, who led the redevelopment of 18th & Vine in Kansas City.

"You've actually done it?"

BET.

Coming back from spring break, I became illuminated and possessed by the notion of bringing old and new friends together.

Lejuano Varnell, executive director of Sweet Auburn Works (SAW), was too.

Auburn Avenue and 4th Avenue share many elements, but one has had the Olympics and one hasn't. We realized that we could learn from one another given that our neighborhoods are at different stages revitalization, displacement or ... settlement (re-claim, re-, etc.).

That's why we're grateful to the National Trust of Historic Preservation's African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund for granting us the resources to found and convene a network, conference and platform of Historic African-American Neighborhoods and Commercial Districts. Helping HAANDS.

#HAANDS #tellthefullstory

Join us next week for our inaugural conference (virtual), May 27 and May 28!

Learn more here: www.haands.org