Category: History

1957 Church Survey: Metropolitan AME- Random Church Not In Shaw

I’m not even going to search for a photo. But do a quick and dirty post for Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church at 1518 M St NW.  In 1957 it was a big church, with 1200 members in 1957, with about 400 showing up on any given Sunday. The professional majority were skilled laborers, followed by Professionals and white-collar members. It was and is, as far as I can tell, still a Black church. It does not give a breakdown but claimed many members lived in the Northwest Urban Renewal area under study at the time.

CS 53 Metropolitan AME by Mm Inshaw on Scribd

I Still Don’t Know Why A DOEE Clean Up Is Needed for Q St NW

So Bloomingdame asked me via a tweet why a clean up would be needed for the area of Florida and Q St NW. Then that Sunday Scott Roberts asked me about this. So during my lunch I looked for an answer in the 1970-1969 City Directory, because someone else asked a similar question for another part of Truxton Circle.

I’m guessing the laundries, the car lot and the dry cleaners might have a little something to do with it. Looking at the 1952 aerial photo, there were structures on that section of the street, so maybe someone is being super duper careful or adding a hurdle to development.

Church Survey 1957: St. Mary Mother of God – Random Church Not in Shaw

Okay, another random church not in Shaw but still around. St. Mary is in Fake Chinatown/ Gallery Place at 727 5th St NW. As far as data goes, this is almost useless. They can say 10% of the congregation was Black in 1957. I’d like to know if any of the congregation is Chinese. Because it would be nice to know how less fake Chinatown was in the 50s.

Anyway, here’s the survey.

CS-55-St Mary Mother of God… by on Scribd

Church Survey 1957: Turner Memorial AME- Random Church Not in Shaw

Turner Memorial AME is not in Shaw. It was at 600 Eye Street NW in 1957. It is currently in PG County Maryland. As you may know the synagogue at 6th and I is there, and according to their history page, Turner AME was at 5th and P St (a Shaw church?) and bought the synagogue in 1951. In 2002 Turner AME put the church building up for sale.

Quick look at the survey page, it was a large Black church where half of the members were unskilled laborers. So a working class African-American church. The survey says it was at 5th and D, but the Turner Memorial website says it was founded in 1919 at 5th and P, so let’s go with that.

CS 54 Turner Memorial AME by on Scribd

Church Survey 1957:Church of the Holy City- Random Church Not in Shaw

I have a few of these, churches outside of Shaw but part of the larger Northwest Urban Renewal Project Area. Notable notes are that Church of the Holy City at 1611 16th St NW was a white church in 1957 and kinda small. The congregants who showed up on an average Sunday was 60. Being white, not a lot of members lived in the survey area (the Northwest Urban Renewal Area), half lived in other parts of DC and the other half lived out in the burbs.

CS-57-Church of the Holy City by on Scribd

 

 

1957 Church Survey- Springfield Baptist Church

So I’m bopping to Rick Springfield’s Jessie’s Girl in my head as I type this. The Springfield Baptist Church has nothing to do with the 80s crooner.

Church at P and 6th NWSpringfield Baptist at the corner of P and 6th Street NW, was a steeple church of unknown vintage in 1957, according to its survey entry. I’m not exactly sure what would qualify as a mega-church circa 1957, but Springfield had a large congregation of around 1700 members, 900 of whom showed up on the average Sunday.

So let’s get into the demographic nitty gritty. It is and was a predominately African American church. The occupation spectrum seemed fairly even, a small percentage of professionals, a nice chunk of white-collar workers, some skilled manual and some entrepreneurs.  The largest group were unskilled laborers at 45%, not half but a large percentage.

You might be wondering, was this a commuter church? Yes, no, maybe. Twenty percent lived in the Northwest Urban Renewal Area, which was later shrunk to the Shaw School Urban Renewal Area. There is a mention that about 15% of the membership moved out of the renewal area in the last two years. Seventy percent lived in other parts of the District, in NE and far parts of NW. The far part may have been closer to their former education center at Kansas Avenue and 8th St NW in Petworth. The E.L. Haynes Charter School sits around there now.

CS 14 Springfield Baptist by Mm Inshaw on Scribd

1957 Church Survey: Salem Baptist Church

This doesn’t provide a lot of information.

So unlike the survey pages I really like, this one is fairly sparse. Anyway, today’s feature is Salem Baptist Church at 917 N Street NW in Shaw. It’s a church building on lot 0809, and a residential structure. Looking at PropertyQuest, there’s another lot the church owns on the other side of the main building. The survey does not tell the racial make up. I’m not 100% sure about the major racial make upof it now, but I’ll guess, African American.

CS 11 Salem Baptist by Mm Inshaw on Scribd

Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics: Various reasons for ‘gentrification’ that you don’t want to hear

This is old, but the data I needed was buried in a file. The Institute on Metropolitan Opportunity- University of Minnesota Law School put out a study that was reported on by the Washington Post and DCist. The 7-page study is general and I have no beef with it, but its is the interactive map that has me questioning it.

Truxton by the numbers
I might not know the US in general but I sure as heck know Truxton Circle. Let’s look at the study’s numbers for the change from 2000 to 2016 by race:
Asian: 110
Black: -1232
Hispanic: 34
White: 926

Let’s look at my numbers for 1970 to 2010

Year Total Black White Latino/Asian/ Etc
1970 5830 5768 21 41
1980 3349 3249 61 39
1990 3623 3347 189 87
2000 2997 2713 103 181
2010 3028 1964 816 248

The trend since 1970 was downward for everyone, mainly African-Americans since they/we were slowly departing the neighborhood. So the -2,519 of the Black population in Truxton Circle from 1970 to 1980, can we also call that displacement? It’s much bigger than the loss of 1,232 from 2000 to 2016. Now I’ll acknowledge a bump in populace from 1980 to 1990 of almost 300 people, but apparently by 1990 they several hundred said ‘screw this’ (or got shot) and left in droves by 2000. The 00s had numbers so low, I think those numbers hadn’t been seen since the 19th Century when vast swaths of land were undeveloped.

The loss of Afro-American residents from 2000 to 2010 was 749. The study map has it from 2000 to 2016 down by 1232, so an extra 483 left between 2010 and 2016. There is a trend, prior to gentrification of fewer and fewer Black residents.

Whaddya want White Flight. Again?
Let’s expand that table, shall we? Apologies for not having the Black population for 1940.

Year Total Black White Everyone Else
1940 8244 ….. 1718 ….
1950 7720 6186 1511 23
1960 6789 6716 58 15
1970 5830 5768 21 41
1980 3349 3249 61 39
1990 3623 3347 189 87
2000 2997 2713 103 181
2010 3028 1964 816 248

In 2016 the white population should have crested above one thousand, but still not at 1940s or 1950s levels. So let’s say trends continue and the white population continues to grow, maybe getting back to 1950s levels. You know what happened to DC whites after 1950? They began to leave the city in droves, as did TC whites. So when in complaining about the growing the white population, is it a request for white flight?

Various reasons for demographic changes
Demographic changes, aka gentrification. The narrative is that it is displacement. So I return to my question about the loss of 2519 blacks in 1980, was that displacement? Maybe. Was it gentrification? Probably not. Was it crack? That would explain a loss between 1980 and 1990, but there wasn’t a decline. Thinking of my own block I can think of various reasons for the demographic change between 2000 and 2016.

Fewer Section 8s- Or Housing Choice Vouchers or whatever you want to call it, but aka Section 8. There were a few suspected Section 8 houses around, two on my block owned by one fellow who seemed to have gotten into financial trouble and had to sell them. The new owners did not keep them as Section 8, but lived in them a short while and rented them out at market rate. Fewer landlords are chasing Section 8 renters, when the area attracts market-rate renters. And there are accidental landlords (former resident homeowners) who are not savvy or interested in the voucher program.

Not a one to one exchange- My next door neighbors, 2 white men, bought their house from a black family of 5 (mom, dad, two kids, and grandpa). Units that had larger families got replaced by singles and childless couples.

Not enough middle-class Black people moving in- Think of the population from year to year as a river of water that is fed by tiny little streams. As low-income African Americans moved out they’d be replaced by other low-income AfAms. However, this flow is blocked by the loss of low-income rentals in favor of mixed-income and luxury rentals and for sale housing. The city government is more likely to increase low-income housing in areas where property is cheap, so not here. But if the goal is racial diversity, then middle-class Black families would need to stream in. However, there aren’t enough middle-class Black households interested in moving into the urban core. Also, programming targeted at AfAms are more interested in having low-income Blacks as clients, as opposed to creating strong, independent middle-class Blacks.

1957 Church Survey- First Rising Mt. Zion Baptist Church

UPDATE- Picture added.

First Rising Mt Zion Baptist Church buildingThis is going to be a quick one, and I don’t have a picture.

First Rising Mt. Zion, just looking at the 1957 survey answers appears to have been a more working-class Black church, where many of the members lived in the urban renewal area. With the previous surveys for other Black churches in Shaw, I was seeing a more middle-class group and began forming a theory behind it, and then this shows up in the rotation and blows that theory to heck.

CS-2-First Rising Mt Zion by Mm Inshaw on Scribd


Well, this survey and the church’s own history. The 1957 survey has Rev. Ernest Gibson as the head pastor, and when we drop down to his tenure as the shepherd of the flock their history has this to say.

Rev. Ernest R. Gibson, Sr. was called as the second pastor of First Rising on January 14, 1952 and began his tenure of service on February 3, 1952. He came to First Rising with his wife, Mrs. Etta C. Gibson, and three children, Ernest, Jr., Delores and Mark. During Rev. Gibson’s tenure, payments on the property at 1215 8th Street, NW were completed in 1952. In December 1954, the red brick church on the corner of 6th and N Streets, NW was purchased; the second trust of the church was paid off on October 22, 1966, and the mortgage burning ceremony was held on Sunday, May 21, 1967.

So in 1957, they were kinda new to the block. Their previous location of 1215 8th Street NW is currently somewhere inside the Convention Center. They moved around a little bit since their founding in 1939.

Okay, back to the demographics of the church. It was an African American church with a large unskilled manual labor workforce membership (62%). The professionals (5%) and white collar (15%) parishioners were a smaller percentage. Considering the economics of the neighborhood in 1957, it would make sense that the church would draw its working class membership from the surrounding area.

Forget Go-Go Bring Back the Jazz to Shaw

Duke Ellington and unknown woman @ Howard Theater(?)

So there was that story about the Go-Go music being blasted at 7th and Florida. And more stories about Go-Go and the changing neighborhood, as if neighborhoods don’t change. Neighborhoods, cities, cultures change. There used to be jazz in Shaw. Good jazz, as in the kind you can dance to. But that kind of jazz is not something you’ll find listed at the Howard Theater, the only reason to go to the Dunbar Theater is to bank with Wells Fargo, and Bohemian Caverns is dark.

The jazz I like is gone and it probably won’t come back to Shaw.

I can’t blame gentrification. I can’t even blame the riots. What is to blame is what comes to all forms of popular and even niche genres, tastes and audiences change. What has befallen the jazz I like (I’m ignoring that other stuff that calls itself jazz) could easily fall upon Go-Go. The audience that grew up with it gets older, younger audiences are more into something else. The artists change, they may want to pursue or try new things. The market changes, as people stop buying CDs and CD players and Spotify/Pandora-rify their music. Also, I’ve been told Go-Go is best experienced live. For me, the artists changed and started creating undancable, unsingable jazz that decoupled itself from popular music, and younger audiences were getting into Rock-n-Roll.

So, for now, there is a phone store that sells Go-Go CDs on the side and blasts Go-Go music outside. Considering record stores do more closing than opening, I’m going to guess the money is in being a phone store. It’s unreasonable to expect the neighborhood to support one genre of music. If the neighborhood’s history of musical support is anything to go by, the best one can hope for is having a few buildings, maybe a street named after artists, and half-aszed attempts by city bureaucrats at music appreciation. Businesses are going to do what they need to do to stay in business. Customers are going to buy what they want to buy, in the format they want to purchase. And all of that will bring the end of Go-Go, not a neighbor who wants the music turned down.