#sharp-leadenhall

[jpetronensf]

Active Connections

Summer in Baltimore is here, and the mercury tells no lies. The young men involved in Clean and Green are hard at work, as are we, engulfed with Anthropology by the Wire. As most of us know, when you work hard, it's necessary to get your mind off chiseling the tablet, and unwind a little. After spending some time with the C&G team on Monday, we followed up on a request to play a pick up game of baseball, a great opportunity to unwind, right? Moses, Crystal, Claire, Raul and I meet up with Darious and Edward, following them over to the diamond in Solo Gibb park, tucked away in a section of Sharp-Leadenhall. From the field, looking east, cars fill a large parking lot located underneath I-395. The light rail can be seen gliding along both north, and south from the Hamburg station. M&T Bank Stadium provides a moutainesque backdrop of concrete, steel, and purple accents. The scene has me captivated in a sense of wonder. The highway above acts as immense beams cutting across the sky. A massive billboard steals ocular depth to the south. I feel so small in the midst of structures that seem to constrict and wrap around us. In the midst of this space, the sun beats down relentlessly with clouds few and far between as the aging afternoon hours progress. Darious and Eddy break out their gear and we started warming up, both in temperature and, you know, tossing the ball around and taking some practice cuts with the bat. In the distance Stefon makes his way to join us. His brother Devin joined in a little later on as well. We split up into teams and started playing. Let me just say something, those guys in C&G, can crush a baseball! A chain link fence lined the back of the outfield which got throughly acquainted with the ball soaring over it. Come to find out, most of the guys have played on teams and it was no surprise. The whole game was lighthearted and produced some beneficial interactions between all of us. A sense of comfortability settled in as we played America's great pastime. Laughter for the most part can be useful when gauging the overall mood of a group, and there was a lot of that going on. It was interesting to see some passerby’s heading to the Oriole's game somewhat fixated on what we were up to. Although the game was nothing new to the black and orange fans, they still felt compelled to observe us as they walked along. Thinking back, I feel when positivity is in the air, people can't help but catch a whiff, and hopefully it leaves an impression which pollinates the hearts of others.

[jpetronensf]

Hot off the press. Featuring Ms Bland-Thomas and Dr. Durington

[jpetronensf]

South Baltimore Partnership

Crawling along the jammed downtown streets at a pace that could compete with a snail, anticipation weighing heavy on the mind, and a stomach gradually calling out for sustenance, the controls were set for Martini Lutheran Church, located in Sharp-Leadenhall. There was no turning back now. Ms. Betty Bland-Thomas, president of the South Baltimore Partnership organized a community meeting to discuss a couple issues concerning the Sharp-Leadenhall neighborhood. One of the topics of discussion involved the Solo Gibbs recreation center and second topic surrounded the proposal of a 250 million dollar mixed-use development project. Our aim of the night was to capture audio and video footage of the meeting. With media equipment laid out on the back table we quickly fastened camera's to selected pods, prepped the audio recorder, and positioned ourselves in different points in the hall attempting to achieve a well rounded representation of the evening. The well lit room slowly filled up with local residents as Ms Betty briefly touched on topics that would be further discussed as the night went on. Also among those in attendance, the vice principle of Sharp-Leadenhall elementary, a professor from University of Maryland, and representatives from the Assessment & Taxation Department offered time to discuss issues. As the meeting dug deeper into the evenings topics, some residents were quick to vocalize opinions and concerns. With each topic, there was dialogue. I don't recall at any point silence taking the stand when issues were brought up. In fact, on several occasions Ms Betty had to interject and politely steer the conversation of residents to manageable terrain. She actually did a great job with keeping the discussion on track. Some solid points of view were laid out and an overall sense of community was present in the room. This was my first community meeting, and I was thankful to be an observer feeling out the mix. There was an old fashioned feel that was woven into the evenings meeting. Grassroots if you will. That fact that a community can get together and openly discuss thoughts about the space in which they live seems pivotal to the structure of any zone inhabited by humans. "Our focus is community engagement" and that's what it's all about.

[jpetronensf]

The President of the Sharp-Leadhall Planning Committee, Ms Betty Bland. Touching on history and preservation.

[bethannethropology]

Review of Sharp-Leadenhall: A Promise to Keep - Beth Holl

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLFHq94GikE

This entire semester, I have had only one day completely cleared with no exceptions: December 8th. That was the day I signed up to volunteer at Sharp-Leadenhall. I still have it circled and highlighted in my planner. 

After hearing some tidbits and stories from other classmates about what it was like, I was actually looking forward to it, and not just for the bonus. It was something I have never done; an opportunity I normally never would have seized. 

Unfortunately, that day never did happen for me, but watching the video "Sharp-Leadenhall: A Promise to Keep" gave me a deeper insight to what I would have been witnessing had I physically volunteered in that historic neighborhood.

In the video, I got a close look at many of Sharp-Leadenhall's residents. They spoke with nostalgia of better times they had as kids in the neighborhood, known as a famous African American neighborhood in Baltimore since the 1700's where freed slaves took residence there. 

The residents spoke of the 1950's, where the city really let Sharp-Leadenhall go: outhouses and dirt yards and roads were a common sight in the span of the neighborhood. In the late 50's, the city of Baltimore bought out houses and evicted the longtime renters. They planned on running a highway straight through the neighborhood. Due to major community activism, the highway plans were later altered- but the damage was done as many of the residents had already moved out. Only about 500 remained in Sharp-Leadenhall.

Later, around 1978, the neighborhood was in a dilapidated state- it was just standing, but barely. The city zoned half of it as an area for urban renewal and beautified the houses, raising the rent so high that the previous renters could not even try to afford it. It effectively pushed out the African American population, transforming the updated section of Sharp-Leadenhall to Otterbein, a 75% white neighborhood. 

More recently in the 90's, community pressure led to residents of Sharp-Leadenhall being able to actually own property, which many of them now do. 

Although I never got to volunteer, knowing what I do now from this video has shown me that Sharp-Leadenhall is a highly active and lively community that has definitely seen its struggles. I am more aware now of the issues it faces- who knows, maybe I'll end up volunteering next semester by my own account! :)

Beth Holl

[libertyfrank]

There are a handful of things that come to mind when one hears the word "gentrification"– some good, some bad. Perhaps cleaned up streets, boutique shops, and people biking to work are what comes to mind when you think of gentrification. Or maybe it leaves a bitter taste in your mouth, when you think of the people displaced as a neighborhood gets "nicer". When I think of the word "gentrification", I don't have good thoughts. But driving through Sharp-Leadenhall today, I kept on oohing and ahhing at the brick rowhouses with little wooden doors, the vintage bike leaned up outside a restaurant, the plethora of people walking their Boston terriers and French bulldogs. As we drove along, I snapped photo after photo of cute street corners with brightly colored doors. More than once the thought "I would love to live here" crossed my mind. All the while, in the back of my mind, was the history of Sharp-Leadenhall. Now an up-and-coming haven for hipsters and artists, Sharp-Leadenhall was historically an African-American neighborhood dating back to pre-Civil War. In 1967, a line was cut through the community* by the city in order to build a highway. Although the highway project never came to fruition, rows of historic homes were torn down and thousands of residents were displaced. The ones who remained would see the development of homes bought by the city but not demolished, and watch as the demographics of their neighborhood changed; from low-income black residents, to middle-class urban whites hoping to help establish a nice, trendy new neighborhood with that pined after historic feel. I don't know how to feel, knowing that I'm the sort of person who, given the chance, would happily move into the newly refurbished neighborhood. But about the people who lived in the Sharp-Leadenhall of 1967, the real historic Sharp-Leadenhall? Though most of them may have already left the neighborhood, willingly or otherwise, wouldn't I still be a contributing factor to the loss of their homes and community? Though the neighborhood may be advertised by a sign welcoming you to "historic" Sharp-Leadenhall, nothing about the town today tells of it's rich history. *Originally I had included a link to an article citing this fact, but the link is now dead.

[phollandnsf]

After doing some research yesterday on Sharp-Leadenhall at the Pratt Library in Baltimore I tracked down this article. While gentrification might seem like a good idea because it improves the community and increases revenue it also ruins lives of long-time citizens of the neighborhood and sometimes seeks to change or add history concerning the area. It seems that once you add the prefix of “Historic” to a neighborhood you drive out the working class residents and draw in more hipsters or higher class individuals. Again this may sound like a good thing but that neighborhood already had history and in some cases the people in charge of the changes choose to ignore that history and supplement their own ideologies to fit with the type of people they want to attract. In this article they discuss the gentrification of Sharp-Leadenhall (which I drove through today without realizing I was in the right place because it was so gentrified) and the issues that have arisen from this process in the community. When I drove through “Historic Sharp-Leadenhall” I was a little lost. I had heard this name attached to a predominantly black neighborhood, while  was there I saw maybe two black people in the entire area. I was so confused and convinced I was in the wrong place that my colleagues and I had to contact Dr. Durington to make sure we were in the right place. How could this happen? Simple, in order to reduce the normal problems of urban settings they removed what they thought was the problem, the people, and replaced them with more socially acceptable residents. A historically significant area was essentially lost by these actions because what made Sharp-Leadenhall so special was the people who built it up over the decades.

[eaboschnsf-blog]

Ebenezer AME, Sharp-Leadenhall

Today I had the joy of exploring the archives of the Enoch Pratt Free Library.  I took down some very interesting notes on some very interesting things!

"Creeping Georgetown" and Ebenezer AME Baptist Church

Ebenezer AME Baptist Church was established in 1865 by John W. Jones, the great grandson of slave rebel and freedom fighter Nat Turner, however the roots of the congregation itself go back to 1816, when the members of the future Ebenezer church met for religious service inside a blacksmith's shop.

W.E.B. Dubois, in his writings on African Americans and religion, equates the Black priest with the pre-Columbian, pre-slavery medicine man of African pagan religions.  Dubois theorizes that the Baptist Church has such an influence on black communities because the ritual of baptism speaks to the "mystic temperament" of African Americans' religious roots. 

Ebenezer AME was a pillar of the community for years, until the City of Baltimore notified them that it and much of the surrounding area might have to be demolished for the construction of I-95.  The city warned Ebenezer not to make any big renovations that would go to waste in the event of its demolition.  in the 10 years that Ebenezer sat condemned for demolition by the city, it accrued $400,000 worth of needed repairs. 

After they were allowed to return to the church, this combination gothic-Romanesque revival style building was slated for a $25,000 grant for exterior repairs by the US government, but thanks to Reagan's budget cuts, the money never came. 

 Now the congregation of Ebenezer must fear what its former Reverend Murph calls "Creeping Georgetown", the rapid redevelopment and urban renewal of its neighborhood. 

Sharp-Leadenhall

Sharp-Leadenhall faced the same demolition as Ebenezer, but in this case, the cities orders were carried out.  Sharp-Leadenhall's roots date back to the early 1700s, but the manifest destiny of I-95 payed no mind.  Many people were displaced, and forced out of their homes as a result of the building of the interstate.  In 1974, the neighborhood was set up for urban renewal, even when the residents would no longer be able afford the hike in real estate prices.  2/3 of Sharp-Leadenhall families depend on public assistance and social security, and 1/3 have annual incomes that are less than $2,400 a year.