Tracing a Black Enclave from the 18th to the 21st Centuries
How the federal city acquired the land to build Lafayette Elementary School and Park in Chevy Chase DC in 1931 was not litigated in the local newspapers, which otherwise dutifully reported petty thieveries and Sunday social visits as news.
In fact, nearly all the coverage through the 1920s had to do with the severe crowding of the current school and the need to build a new one for all the white suburbanites buying into the Chevy Chase Land Company ideal. When the site of the new school was finally announced, it was presented as a done deal – a seemingly uncontroversial buyout of a handful of landowners on Broad Branch Road.
Black Land Loss Navigation
But that “deal” – which wiped a long-established African American enclave off the map, causing multi-generational implications still felt a century later – was years in the making and involved a combination of targeted racial actions aimed at removing Blacks from the vicinity and then enacting covenants to prevent their re-entry. Evidence indicates it included increasing Jim Crow practices and policing that made it difficult for Blacks to continue living there, as well as government-backed actions, such as land seizure for tax delinquency and the use of eminent domain to build public structures.
This “lost” history was not a passive happenstance but an aggressive act that places Chevy Chase DC in a very particular arc of American history that is increasingly prompting discussions in similar communities across the country as they try to correct the historical record.
This is what led Historic Chevy Chase DC to partner with the University of the District of Columbia and produce oral histories of seven descendants of these displaced landowners. Through this exercise, we delve into what multi-generational effects might have been caused by this displacement, and what the “loss” of the story to memory means to those whose forebears were in the line of fire when this occurred nearly 100 years ago in Chevy Chase DC.
One thing is immediately clear: Only the story was lost, not the damage. It’s still being felt a century later, according to the descendants. “We were not lost, we were run out of town and displaced” was how Jocelind Edwards Julien sees it. She is a direct descendant of the Shorter/Dorsey family who had lived on Broad Branch Road for more than half a century before being evicted.
These are their stories. The full oral histories will be available to historians in the future. For now, we have compiled vignettes from the material and extracted important excerpts.
Meet the Descendants
James Fisher
“I had no idea that my family had been in this area for so long. In my lifetime, the family has been divided and disconnected. One could not imagine that there was a time when they forged a very strong bond … The knowledge that such people were in your family inspires generations.”
Sylvia Fisher Gregory
“[T]here are millions of people that were robbed of their properties, and it’s still going on today. You know, I just can’t think about just one person. It can’t be about just me. It’s about millions of us, constantly being robbed by (white people).”
Tanya Gaskins Hardy
“African Americans are the only race in this country that don’t have a home. We don’t have land. And people are saying, ‘Well, go back to Africa.’ Well, that’s all well and good. And I’m definitely claiming my African heritage. But I would also like to be able to claim my American heritage too, and have a space that’s mine, just like everybody else can have a space.”
Jocelind Edwards Julien
“When my grandmother got older, the only one place that she asked to go (back to visit) was Chevy Chase. The only one place out of all of the places that she ever lived, and all of her experiences traveling and whatnot, Chevy Chase was the one place she asked to go back home to.”
Karen Pannell Gilliam
“It (the wealth in the land) could have been trickled down. . .We could have had so much more (today). … But my grandmother didn’t have a lot…when you’re a homeowner you have more of a sense of a – you know, a sense of (pride of possession in the land). Because it’s something – it’s yours, it’s your property. You know, and nobody can take it from you.”
Shirley Fisher Turner
“Let the people hear the story. Not any one of us desires to move to Chevy Chase. Let the residents enjoy the park…. I care about changing the mindset of people about who was ruined in the African American community (and to) … correct the wrongs done with support such as mentorship, quality education, tutoring services, guidance and support for single parents.”
Susan Fisher Willoughby
“When I said I planned to go to college, (family members who had low expectations) said, ‘College? You’re not that smart!’ So, that was the mindset. You had to be really, really smart to go to college. That just didn’t happen with Black folks.”