Africville: A Ghetto to Some; Home to Us

"They razed Africville; what's the fuss?

A ghetto to some; home to us."

(Africville poem, Linda Jonasson)

It had a garbage dump, an abattoir and a jail.  It had no street lights, no running water and no paved streets.  But it did have flowers.  It did have small colourful homes.  It did have a church, a school and a post office.  And it had a strong sense of community.  

Africville was a black settlement on the shores of Bedford Basin at the edge of Halifax.  Its residents are descended from Black Loyalists who arrived after the American Revolution.  For close to two hundred years, they lived in Africville, working Monday to Friday and attending Seaview Baptist Church on Sunday.  Their children attended the school, also located in the church.  While they may have been poor in the pocketbook, they were rich in spirit.  

Urban planners who visited Africville in the 1960's "did not see the flowers" (http://alinefromlinda.blogspot.ca/2016/02/africville-he-did-not-see-flowers.html).  They only saw the garbage.  They did not see the quaint church; they only saw the jail.  They did not see a close knit community; they saw a ghetto.

They pressured the home owners into selling and, one by one, the houses were bulldozed.  A resident would go to bed with a neighbour beside him, only to wake up to a pile of dirt.  They even bulldozed the church in the middle of the night.  Africvillians were forced to relocate in Halifax tenements, their land lost, their sense of community destroyed.

In 2010, Seaview Baptist Church was rebuilt to honour the residents of Africville.  In 2014, Canada Post issued a stamp to commemorate Africville.  

Note:  For more information about Africville, watch the National Film Board of Canada presentation "Remember Africville" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28cvg6iD7lA).

https://www.canadapost.ca/cpo/mc/assets/images/stamps/2014_black_history_stamp.jpg

Africville: He Did Not See the Flowers

Every Spring my husband, a university professor, starts teaching his intercession courses again.  One of the topics he discusses is Africville, a former black “ghetto” on the shores of Bedford Basin in Halifax, Nova Scotia.  He shows a video to his students made by the National Film Board of Canada called “Remember Africville”.

The video features a black man named Gus Wedderburn who was asked to investigate the ghetto in the 1950’s when the city planners were considering tearing it down.  The man, quite well spoken, described Halifax as being devoid of coloured people and said that “where the asphalt ended and the dirt road began, that is where Africville started.”  Although Africvillians paid taxes, they did not receive the modern amenities that the rest of Halifax did.  Africvillians tried hard to keep up the physical appearance of their village, and yet this outsider “did not see the flowers”.  Rather, he saw a ghetto.  He did not see the families that had toiled for over a hundred years to maintain their jobs and their homes.  He saw a ghetto.  He did not see Seaview Baptist Church, at the centre of their community, where parishioners gathered on Easter Sunday morning for baptism on the shores of Bedford Basin.  He saw a ghetto.  He did not see the students walking to the church, which doubled as a school, on a Monday morning with books tucked under their arm.  He saw a ghetto.  He did not see the flowers. 

Unfortunately, in the mid-1960’s, the city planners razed Africville and turned the land into a park.  Africvillians were paid the meager sum of $500 for their land, an amount that was considered to be high by the elderly homeowners.  Most residents were relocated to tenements in the city of Halifax, as urban planners did in American cities like Detroit and Chicago.  Yes, now these residents had modern amenities like heat and running water, but they no longer owned anything.  Furthermore, they lost their sense of community.  It has been over forty years and they still miss that community.  In fact, “the hermit of Africville”, Eddie Carvery, now camps out in Seaview Park, where he once lived with his family.  Below is a sonnet I wrote about the community.  God Bless Africville!

AFRICVILLE

Africville had no millionaires,

But it had Carvery's and Skinner's.

Africville had no billionaires,

But Seaview Church welcomed sinners.

Africville had not one street light,

But its sunsets lasted for hours.

In Africville we smelled garbage at night,

But we also smelled the flowers.

Africville roads were not on par,

But it sat on a pretty bay.

Africville had not one street car,

But the freedom train came one day.

They razed Africville; what's the fuss?

A "ghetto" to some; home to us.

Linda Jonasson

Photo courtesy hrsbstaff.ednet.ns.ca

*Note:  This post was first published in 2011.  At this time, Seaview Baptist Church was rebuilt to remember the Africville community.