The Carolina Times reports the story of Hayti's vanished dreams

The history of Durham’s Hayti community and the impact of urban renewal screams on the pages of The Carolina Times.

When presented with the proposal to build a freeway through the heart of Durham’s Hayti community, Black leaders promoted an opportunity to advance economic development.

“Not only are we in favor of the urban renewal part of the measure, but we are in favor of the bond issue in its entirety,” Louis Alston, publisher and editor of The Carolina Times, wrote on Sept. 22, 1962. “To be against it would place us in the position of limiting progress which is entirely out of line with the role this newspaper has endeavored to play during its approximately 40 years of experience.”

Alston conveys concern regarding white voters’ opposition to Durham urban renewal.

“If the bond issue is passed in its entirety, it will have to be passed by a solid Negro vote plus that of the few progressive and fair-minded white voters who are noble enough to rise above the level of prejudice and narrowness in supporting it,” Alston writes. “Frankly, we see no need of Negroes kidding themselves about the inevitable position the race holds in Durham.”

In the Sept. 15, 1962, issue of The Carolina Times, Alston warned Black voters of the possible defeat of the Urban Renewal Bond.

“As badly as the urban renewal project is needed for the future development of Durham as a whole, the mere fact that the anticipated improvements will be devoted for the most part to a Negro section is a kiss of death,” Alston writes. “The mass of white voters of this city will not respond favorably to any movement that means the betterment of the Negro’s lot. This has been proved again and again and there is no prospect that the condition will take a turn for the better on October 6 or soon thereafter.”

Ninety percent of Durham’s Black residents voted in support of the bond that displaced 600 Black residents and106 Black-owned businesses. Voters believed urban renewal would trigger massive economic progress in a community suffering due to a decline in population.

“The time has come when progressive white and Negro citizens here must rise above the program of race hatred, prejudice, bigotry, envy and jealousy that is now being advanced by Durham’s usual busy bodies when measures of progress are proposed,” Alston writes in his Sept. 22 editorial. “They must stand together, or Durham is certain to continue the state of stagnation and small pace progress it has experienced during the past 25 years which has seen it drop from the state’s fourth city in size to the fifth in position.”

Support for the urban renewal project dwindled after members of the White Rock Baptist Church scrambled to find a new location for their church edifice after the ravaging of their historical edifice.

“With many of Durham’s leading business and professional men and women, occupying positions on its roster of officers, the members of White Rock awakened one morning to find themselves out of doors, so far as having a place of their own in which to worship,” The Carolina Times reports on May 23, 1970. “Thus, they were forced to resort to the use of facilities at North Carolina Central University and a sister church, during the interim of the raising of their old House of Worship and the erection of a new edifice at another location.”

The Carolina Times challenged the members of St. Joseph AME Church to consider legal action in preparation for their forced relocation.

“Because of the critical situation experienced by White Rock, we feel it our bounden duty to sound a note of warning to the minister, officers and members of St. Joseph’s to get about their Father’s business, at once, and set their House of Worship in order, to determine whether surrounding circumstances of the present structure will eventually demand that they seek an outright new location as well as the erection of a new church edifice or be allowed to remain at its present site,” The Carolina Times states on May 23, 1970. “In the case of St. Joseph’s which has on its membership roll nine or more lawyers, as well as a member of the Urban Renewal, we would recommend that every legal angle be explored to determine whether the church has any chance of holding the Urban Renewal organization to its original proposal, which would have provided the church with sufficient area for parking at the present location, or whatever growth or development it may desire in the future.”

The May 23, 1970, article in The Carolina Times serves as a reminder of both the power and limitations of two of Durham’s most influential institutions – St. Jospeh AME Church and White Rock Baptist Church. The strain of urban renewal impacts the entirety of Durham’s Black community. The challenge to the members of St. Joseph “to get about their Father’s business” recognizes the massive power within the congregation.

Urban renewal transcendent the burden among poor Black residents devoid of the resources to battle the consequence of displacement. The demolition of White Rock’s historical edifice radically shifted the conversation. The Carolina Times, the leadership of the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People and Black residents recognized the smell in the air. They inhaled the aroma of a decaying community.

The Black community felt the pain of being hoodwinked.

Vivian Edmonds assumed control of The Carolina Times after her father, Louis Alston, died in 1971. The tone in editorials shifted from approval to extreme disdain.

“If ever an injustice and dastardly scheme was perpetrated on black folk in Durham, it seems to have been the so-called Urban Renewal Program,” The Carolina Times reports in the June 18, 1977, edition. “Outside of a few affluent families who seem to remain non-committal, the rest of the black folk who have been and are being affected, have renamed the fiasco “Black Removal” and tell some wicked stories of treatment.”

Stories of unfair treatment and dismal payments pack the pages of the Black-owned newspaper.  Edmonds offers The Carolina Times as an example of negligence in relocating businesses.

“Ours happens to be one of the last of three businesses left to be ‘relocated’, out of approximately 106 that made up the once flourishing Hayti section of Durham, which were affected by the so-called ‘urban renewal’ programs,” the June 18, 1977, editorial claims. “If our experience is typical, then God forbid what has happened to others.”

The Carolina Times called for the launching of an investigation into the entire urban renewal program.

“If it is found that people have been cheated – no matter how far back in this program -they ought to be paid,” the editorial states. “If black folks have been sold down the river by their own, then they, and the world, ought to know it. If they have not, then such an investigation would put a stop to the heinous stories that abound.”

On Sept. 11, 1982, 20 years after the start of Durham’s Urban Renewal project, The Carolina Times reported negotiations between Durham city planners and eight Black business owners seeking relocation.

Paul Norby, former director of Durham’s planning department, contracted with the Durham Black Business and Professional Chain to plan how to fit these businesses into a Hayti redevelopment proposal.

Ervin Allen, Jr., executive director of the Black Business and Professional Chain, related disappointment with city officials because the eight businesses weren’t involved in the contract planning process. Allen said the process lacked foresight making it impossible to fulfill the terms of the contract within six months “because it would take that long to get the businesses into discussions.”

“The businesses refused to let the Chain see their financial books,” The Carolina Times reports. “These same businesses had consistently refused to let city planners see their books as a requirement for relocation.”

The businesses are: The Carolina Times, Imperial Barber Shop, Dreamland Shoe Shine, Thorpe’s Barber Shop, Green Candle Restaurant, E.N. Toole Electrical Contractors, Service Printing Company and Midway Sport Shop.

On Dec. 5, 1981, The Carolina Times reports five businesses remain housed in a temporary facility known as “Tin City”, built in 1969 with a goal of lasting 18 months while preparing to relocate displaced businesses.

“To resolve this last barrier to the redevelopment of NCR-54, the city has taken two important steps. First, it has rewritten the Urban Renewal plan for the area in such a way that renewal of the area no longer will have to be restored comparable to its early composition or even to provide needed services for the community,” The Carolina Times reports. “Secondly, the city’s plan calls for a $40,000 contract with the Durham Business and Professional Chain to ‘assist’ the relocatees to move into the commercial development east of Fayetteville Street. It appears that the city is willing to ‘assist’ with construction of a building, only if it is located in this area.”

The eight businesses involved questioned the Black Business and Professional Chain awareness of the original urban renewal concept and believed that plan to be completely compromised by the city’s revised plan.

“This plan offered very little time for community input and the plan was not publicized at all,” The Carolina Times reports. “A full discussion of its implications would have been almost impossible.”

The Hayti Development Corporation (HDC) was formed based on the suggestion of the Economic Development Sub-Committee of the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People. HDC proposed a plan making Hayti an extension of downtown.

The plan proposed converting the old Service Printing Company building into a museum, bookstore, restaurant and office space surrounded by a park. HDC proposed a hotel-restaurant complex, a large grocery store, a variety store, specialty store, barber/beauty shops, pharmacy, hardware store and a retail clothing store south of the expressway.

After reviewing HDC’s proposal, city planners proposed hiring a consultant to consider the recommendations. Nat White, Jr., executive director of HDC, expressed concern that city planners asked the wrong questions.

“We’re looking at implementation,” White said in the Sept. 18, 1982, edition of the Carolina Times. “The study should say how a particular development can be made to work rather than simply saying it won’t work.”

The Carolina Times accused city planners of having their sight on 54 acres of prized land in the Hayti district with easy access to the Research Triangle Park.

“This is a battle of power and money. The stakes are high. To city planners, the area compliments plan to rebuild downtown. In their judgment, the old Hayti is fertile ground for planning houses to give the revitalized downtown people a 24-hour life.”

Aftermath of faded dreams

A decade after the formation of Hayti Development Corporation, White endured a scandal forcing him out as Executive Director, ending the dreams of Black leaders.

On January 14, 1979, the building that Housed The Carolina Times burned to the ground. Not much survived the fire. The entire back stock of papers vanished in the flames along with all those dreams. Authorities suspect arson, a sad ending to a long legacy of reporting in Durham’s Hayti community.

Edmonds didn’t stop working. A new issue showed up on the Thursday after the fire. Hayti residents didn’t give up. They keep working to rebuild and rekindle the community’s hopes and dreams.

Henry McKoy, a faculty member and director of entrepreneurship at North Carolina Central University, leads the charge in renewing those dreams. He calls it a rebirth – like the words of the prophet, Maya Angelou – “you may trod me in the very dirt. But still, like dust. I’ll rise.”

What does renewal look like for Black people? Is it the gift of new public housing? No.

It’s the gift of being heard.

“All of this is to say that city council and city planners have always been reluctant to let blacks have a say in how their former black community should be rebuilt,” The Carolina Times reports on Sept. 18, 1982.

Listen to the prophets speak.

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