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Brightwood's Historic African American Community 4 27-2017
- 1. Brightwood’s Historic African American Community Mapping Segregation in Washington DC, Ward 4 Prologue DC, April 27, 2017
- 3. African American landowners in Fort Stevens area, 1881 (Carpenter Atlas) CarAf
- 4. Military Road not yet built. (1859 Boschke map)
- 6. “Camp Brightwood, D.C. Contraband in 2nd R.I. Camp”
- 7. “Camp Brightwood, D.C. Contraband in 2nd R.I. Camp”
- 8. Why 3 schools? (1894 Hopkins map)
- 10. 1873 Rumsey map
- 11. County schools authorized by Congress May 20, 1862. Funds to buy land and build schools authorized July 28, 1866.
- 12. From an 1870 report:
- 13. Teacher Harvey Smith hired for the District 3 colored school in May 1866. (Evening Star, August 18, 1866)
- 14. For the white school: one acre at $300
- 16. 1873 Rumsey map
- 17. From an 1870 report:
- 18. In November 1866, one-half acre of Butler land was condemned for the District 3 colored school. Payment = $100
- 19. A second piece of Butler land, on the opposite side of the road, made up the rest of the lot for the school. The payment for this land = $10.96.
- 20. CarAf Military Road School (colored) Military Road School (white)
- 21. District 3 African American school Average attendance in 1867-68 = 30 (Number of names on roll = 56)
- 22. Teacher Salaries (annual) in 1866-67 White schools Male teachers = $720 Female teachers = $540 “Colored” Schools All teachers = $510
- 23. As of 1886 Military Road School Annex (colored) Military Road School (colored) Brightwood School (white)
- 24. Brightwood School (white) built 1886, seen ca. 1900.
- 25. Military Road School, built 1866 for whites, moved to “Colored Division” 1886, seen ca. 1900.
- 26. New brick Military Road School built 1912. (photo ca. 1954)
- 27. The African American Community around Fort Stevens
- 28. African American landowners in Brightwood, 1881 CarAf
- 29. 1887 Hopkins map
- 30. 1903 map
- 31. 1919 Baist map
- 32. St. Luke’s Baptist Church, 14th Street and Rock Creek Ford Road, 1948.
- 35. Evening Star, June 12, 1936
- 36. 1945 Baist map
- 37. Evening Star, June 4, 1939
- 38. Evening Star, Feb. 2, 1941
- 40. Rock Creek Ford Road, ca 1950
- 41. Rock Creek Ford Road, ca 1950
- 42. 1954 Baist map
- 44. Apt building on site of old Military Road School Annex, 14th Street and Rock Creek Ford Road, under construction in 1948.
- 45. 1937
- 46. : St. L 1960: St. Luke’s is still there.
- 47. A remnant of the old community, seen in 2016.
- 48. END
Editor's Notes
- We’ve been working on this project since 2014 and have been lucky to receive grant funding from Humanities DC and the DC Preservation League. One of our grant sponsors has been the Military Road School Preservation Trust, many of whose members are alumni of the Military Road School, and as part of the project we researched the history of the school and the land it sits on, as well as the community around it. Here’s the school today, at 1375 Missouri Avenue (which used to be called Military Road). The Military Road School once was the centerpiece of an African American community in Brightwood that predated the school and the neighborhood.
- Long before the Civil War at least five large properties in Brightwood belonged to free African American families – these five (the largest is actually two). Research has shown that at least one family was already there by 1837: the Shamwell family – which in fact is still in the area.
- We know that Georgia Avenue – then known as the 7th Street Turnpike – was paved as far back as 1818, and a village grew up around the crossroads of Milkhouse Ford Road and the turnpike. On this 1859 map you can also see there was a toll booth and a church along Georgia Avenue: Emory Chapel. Milkhouse Ford Road later became Rock Creek Ford Road, and now it’s just a few blocks long, running west of Georgia Avenue. The other side became Shepherd Road. So we knew about the community – It was a community of both black and white families – and we also knew from the Military Road School Preservation Trust that the Military Road School dated to the Civil War.
- During the Civil War Union troops built fortifications all around the city, and one was Fort Stevens, in Brightwood. Here’s the school in relation to Fort Stevens.
- Camp Brightwood was the original name for Fort Stevens. And contraband were African Americans who’d run away from slavery. Many found shelter, work, and safety at Union forts, including here in the District.
- Much has been written about Fort Stevens and the battle that was fought there in July 1864, so this presentation is not going to address it further.
- Looking at this 1894 map, we see little black squares, indicating buildings. Three of them are schools, but none are named.
- Here’s a 1919 map with the three schools. We know that one of them is the Brightwood School – it’s labeled -- which was later torn down and rebuilt just south of Missouri Avenue, where it remains today. We also know that one is the Military Road School, because it’s still there. Pink indicates brick, by the way. And yellow means wood-frame buildings. What’s this other school, then? It’s not labeled on any map, and it’s long gone. We finally figured out the story.
- It’s important to know that until 1871 this whole part of the District of Columbia was governed separately from the City of Washington. Today’s Ward 4 was Washington County, and so was the entire area north of Florida Avenue.
- Before 1862 there was no provision for public schools for African American children in the District. There were schools, but they were established and run privately, by benefactors, churches, and others. Children paid a fee to attend. After emancipation (in April 1862), philanthropic groups established a number of schools. Legislation in 1862 (and refined in 1864) provided for public schools for African American children in Washington, Georgetown, and the county, but very few opened, often due to the hostility of white residents. The legislation established eight county school districts. Two schools would be built in each: one for white children and one for African American. Congress authorized the funds for this in 1866. Districts 1 and 2 were west of Rock Creek. This was District 3; District 4 was around the Soldiers Home. Districts 7 and 8 were east of the Anacostia River.
- The District 3 colored school first opened in a Fort Stevens barracks building in early May 1866 with eight pupils: two boys and six girls.
- A teacher was hired: Harvey Smith.
- The county school commissioners were directed to buy land to build two dedicated school houses. They were able to purchase one acre, for $300, from Wilson King for the white school, as you see on this surveyor’s map.
- Here’s the property. Military Road didn’t exist at the time this map was made, although it had been built at the time the one acre was purchased.
- Here’s the location on the 1873 map, which shows that Military Road had cut this acre off from the rest of King’s land.
- So that was the white school. The county school commissioners had trouble finding a property owner to sell a piece of land for the African American school …
- so they forced the Butler sisters to sell a half-acre lot for $100 …
- plus $10.96 for a second piece of Butler land needed to provide access to the school. The deed says the payment was based on a per-acre rate of $135, less than half of the rate at which they paid Wilson King.
- Here are Sarah Butler Mathews and Elizabeth Butler Savoy on the 1881 map. And here are the two schools. We’re talking one- or two-room schools with a wood stove and an outhouse.
- The African American school had an average attendance of 30 the first couple of years, although more than twice as many school-age children lived in District 3.
- As a teacher, your salary depended on who you were and where you taught.
- In 1886, the white children got a new school house, just south of Emory Chapel. Their old building was turned over to the “Colored Division,” and the existing African American school became known as the Annex. The grades were split between the two buildings. So that’s why there are three schools on the map.
- Here’s a picture of the new white Brightwood School …
- and a picture of the African American Military Road School about 1900. We haven’t found any pictures of the Annex.
- In 1912 the African American Military Road School was replaced with a brick building, the one that still stands. The two wood-frame buildings were later torn down.
- As a reminder, at least five large properties were owned by African American families, going back to the 1830s.
- Here are some of the family names, from an 1887 map. By now the Shamwells, whose roots in the area date to 1837, have sold some of their land. Here’s Grinage, Reynolds, Mathews & Savoy (the Butler sisters), and Elizabeth Proctor Thomas. Actually, when we looked at the 1850 Census, we saw Butlers, Proctors, and Savoys in the same household, so these families were probably related, at least some of them. You can see there’s generally one house on each lot. Fort Stevens is also marked –some of Elizabeth (aka Betsy) Thomas’s land and her house were taken when the fort was built. The two original schools are marked. Emory Chapel – later Emory Methodist – is also marked.
- On the 1903 map we see more land has been subdivided. Elizabeth Thomas’s land is marked “unrecorded subdivision,” although we believe she was still living there. There are houses on Fort Stevens. The brick Brightwood School shows up. St. Luke’s Baptist Church is at the corner of Brightwood (Georgia) Avenue and Shepherd Road (Missouri Ave). This church was one of the anchors of Brightwood’s African American community. In fact, the Military Road School Preservation Trust calls it the Military Road School Church, and it still exists, although it’s moved several blocks south, to 14th and Gallatin. Organized in 1879, it met for two years at the home of Solomon Kemp on Bates Road in the small, racially mixed Woodburn community near Fort Totten. It drew members from that community and also from the Fort Stevens community. In fact, Frank Grinage was one of the founders. It was led by Rev. Shelton Miller from 1879 until his death in 1931. The first church building was on Shepherd Road but we haven’t found the exact location yet. In 1890 the congregation needed more space so it bought land here – where the bank building/dog day care place is now – and built a new church in 1892. (It was designed by the prominent African American architect Calvin Brent. Unfortunately we don’t have a photo.)
- Here’s the church again on this 1919 map. In the 1920s the city decided it needed the land to reconfigure Missouri Avenue, so St. Luke’s moved again in 1928, to 14th Street & Peabody Street, in Square 2726. This was Reynolds land (one of the early African American families), and Rev. Miller was the Reynolds trustee – his name is on this large tract. Presumably he was a descendant.
- Here’s the church in 1948. Obviously construction is going on next door. Descendants of the African American families sold off their land starting in the 1920s. However, some of them developed portions of it themselves and sold or rented the houses.
- This next set of maps shows how the landscape changed. Here’s the 1919 map again and a picture of 10-year-old Earl Shamwell, whose father James Shamwell built their house in 1910. He used an African American architect named Roscoe Vaughn, who was just starting out at that point but later became well-known. This picture was taken in 1920, and this Earl Shamwell is the father of the one who lives on Kennedy Street. As mentioned, pink squares mean brick buildings, and yellow means wood-frame, so you can see that in 1919 all the residential buildings were wood-frame. (Emory Church is brown, meaning it was made of stone.)
- In the 1930s and 1940s a series of apartment buildings and complexes for whites only were built on and around the old African American community. This 1937 map shows the brick Concord Gardens apartments at 13th and Concord Avenue, another name for Military Road for a while, and now Missouri Ave. It also shows that Fort Stevens has become a park, and there’s a new street configuration.
- Here’s an ad for the Concord Gardens Apts.
- By 1945 the area has changed drastically. Almost all the land between 13th and 14th streets is large apartment buildings, including the Fort View Apts, built in 1939, and Rolling Terrace, built in 1941.
- Here are ads for these buildings.
- Just west of these buildings, the 1400 blocks remained more or less the same. Here and on the two following slides are views of some of the old houses along Rock Creek Ford Road, about 1950.
- This is the same street the church was on. We think this house stood next-door to the church, in fact.
- But that area soon changed, as you can see on this 1954 map.
- An apartment building went up on the site of the original African American school (aka the Annex) in the late 1940s.
- Although these properties were not restricted to whites via racial covenants – which were written into deeds – they were in fact open only to whites. Segregation was not only customary and legal, it was a requirement of the Federal Housing Administration. As far as we know, these apartment buildings weren’t built with FHA-insured loans, but their rental policies would certainly have upheld this practice.
- Real estate records show that the Grinage family owned their property until 1949. But by that time the original property had dwindled. In this slide we’ve overlaid the 1881 map – showing the five African American properties – on the 1937 map, which shows reconfigured streets and Fort Stevens as a park. It’s not perfect, but you can see that Fort Stevens Drive took some of the Grinage land and also a big chunk of the other area that had been the African American community, as did Fort Steven Park.
- In 1960 St. Luke’s was still on the map, but it moved that year to Colorado Avenue and then to 1415 Gallatin Street, where it remains today.
- So, the only vestige of Brightwood’s historic African American community is the Shamwells’ 1910 house, tucked in among the red-brick apartment buildings along Fort Stevens Drive. Earl Shamwell Jr. told us his grandfather refused to sell when developers were buying up properties.