Federal grant aids in documenting history of Washington’s Third Ward
From left, Xavier Turner, Oscar Colon, Mackenzie Burch, LaMont Ceaser, Lathan Elder and Kaile Nichols pose with a painting of Joyce Ellis they completed by applying their painted thumbprints to add colors to her hair during the LeMoyne Community Center’s after-school program.
Holly Tonini/Observer-Reporter
A comic strip story on the history of the LeMoyne Community Center, drawn and written by LaMont Ceaser
Courtesy of Rob Phillips
Washington County Redevelopment Authority has in its files this photo of Keystone Elks Lodge on Highland Avenue. The lodge was demolished in 2010.
LaMont Ceaser, 11, and Lathan Elder, 12, study history not only at Washington Park Elementary School, but also at the LeMoyne Community Center, where the motto is “Celebrating Black History Month 365 days a year, not just 28.”
LaMont and Lathan shared with more than 100 visitors Wednesday their knowledge of the site at 200 N. Forrest Ave.: That Robert Forrest, in the 1800s, was a local carriage maker who, when he died, left three acres on the street that now bears his name to the black community.
Holly Tonini/Observer-Reporter
Holly Tonini/Observer-Reporter
Lathan Elder, left, and LaMont Ceaser share a story on the history of the LeMoyne Center Wednesday during a Black History Month celebration.
“It was the Forrest House,” Lathan said as he and LaMont delivered their presentation in the LeMoyne Center’s T.S. Fitch Gymnasium, named for a Washington mayor.
When the center was dedicated in 1956, among the attendees was Jackie Robinson of the Brooklyn Dodgers, who broke Major League Baseball’s color barrier, and Branch Rickey, chairman of the Pittsburgh Pirates Baseball Club, who had brought Robinson to the Dodgers and was among those credited with signing Roberto Clemente.
The LeMoyne Center, which LaMont and Lathan depicted in the form of cartoons, was revived after a 2004 fire and flood by Joyce Ellis and reopened in 2007.
LaMont, Lathan and their listeners aren’t the only ones who were taking note of Washington’s historically black neighborhood.
Observer-Reporter
Observer-Reporter
It was one of nine communities in Pennsylvania that will be included in documentation of what the federal government last year called “under-represented communities.”
The source of the grant, according to the National Park Service website, is revenue from federal oil leases on the outer continental shelf.
Congress appropriated a total of $500,000 Jan. 5, 2017, for 13 projects nationwide through its “Under-represented Community Grant Program.” Information from 10 states was submitted with the objective of creating more diversity in nominations to the National Register of Historic Places.
Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission announced late last year $30,000 will be directed toward study and programs in Washington’s Highland neighborhood and eight others across the state.
Dr. Steven B. Burg, the first specialist in public history in Shippensburg University’s history department, will be part of the local project. He is a former member of the State Historic Preservation Board.
“His class is working on a project related to an African-American cemetery in Shippensburg,” said Shelby Splain, education and outreach coordinator of the State Historic Preservation Office in Harrisburg, part of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission.
“This continues some work started several years ago,” Splain said.
“There was a team I was a part of that was documenting African-American history outside of Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, focusing on suburban and rural areas.”
Significant places in the Lincoln Street neighborhood that are on the state’s list, in addition to the LeMoyne Community Center, are two churches, Wright Memorial African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, also known as Wright’s Chapel, and Nazareth Baptist Church; the Lincoln Terrace housing project, which dates to the early 1940s; and what a study called “slave homes” on East Spruce and East Walnut streets and North Lincoln Avenue that may have been originally built with logs by slaves of John and William Hoge.
Boyd Crumrine’s 1882 “History of Washington County” states, “According to this ancient tradition, the Hoges gave a lot to each slave who would erect a cabin; and that is the reason that section of the town has been from the beginning of the town the negro section.”
On the list of historic buildings, but previously torn down, are the Third Ward Public School; an “African” school at an unknown location, but listed by Crumrine as “West Pine Alley,” which would place it on the opposite side of North Main Street; and the International and Benevolent Protective Order of Elks of the World on Highland Avenue, described in a state report as “once a stately Italianate home.” The last surviving fraternal building associated with Washington’s black community, it was demolished in 2010 for a Community Action Southwest project funded through the Local Share Account of gambling proceeds from The Meadows Racetrack and Casino.
“The grant is to take survey work and research and create historical context,” Splain said of a “document that helps people understand the history and importance or significance. It’s about writing the bigger story.”
She gave as an example that a congregation might produce the history of its church. A history scholar, however, would examine multiple churches, seeking common threads and explaining why they are collectively important.
“It’s a way to organize history so you can understand the building.”
The historians “will be looking at schools, churches and lodges to tell the whole story the best we can,” Splain said.
The State Historic Preservation Office aims to make this type of information “easier for people to use so they will have access to religious institutions, cemeteries, fraternal buildings, what role these institutions played in African-American communities, and what forces shaped an African-American church or cemetery.”
The historic preservation office won’t be nominating buildings as national historic places, but if another organization is interested in taking that step, the state hopes to help make the nomination process easier and simpler.
As part of a survey, a team identified Washington and eight other communities that would be worth a more extensive look.
Also on the under-represented communities list are Bedford, Coatesville, Meadville, Mt. Union, Stroudsburg, Wilkes-Barre, Williamsport and Indiana.
Burg also will be working with the Hallowed Grounds project to develop a database of every black cemetery and burial ground in Pennsylvania.