- BisNow SF
When the Rev. Arnold Townsend was a teenager, he would drive up to San
Francisco from Los Angeles in his friend’s 1955 Chevy. He and his friend would set out on a Friday and spend the weekend partying up and down Fillmore Street. There was a nightlife in Los Angeles, but nothing quite like San Francisco, he said. Julie Littman/Bisnow A mural along Fillmore Street that honors the Fillmore District's jazz era Clubs used to start at Haight and span to north of Clay Street and many also lined Divisadero, according to Townsend, an associate minister at Without Walls Church. There was Half Note, Club Morocco, Elsie’s Breakfast Club, Blue Mirror, Sportsman and countless others. The area was once considered the Harlem of the West. “It was lively,” said Townsend, now in his 70s. “We used to say if you couldn’t meet a girl by 2 a.m., you didn’t deserve one. You could really meet people then.” Every well-known musician on the national stage from Ella Fitzgerald to Miles Davis played and performed in the neighborhood. But once redevelopment started, that culture disappeared. “[Redevelopment] destroyed all of our watering holes,” Townsend said. “All of the places where people gather.” Whole blocks were declared blighted by the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency and jazz clubs and nightclubs were destroyed to make way for housing and new development. They were never replaced. Black families were evicted and hundreds of black-owned businesses were destroyed. Today, less than 5% of the city is made up of African-Americans, according to KTVU. At the neighborhood's peak in 1970, African-Americans made up over 13% of the city's population. While the community that once was may never be again, local advocates are trying to bring back the culture and heritage of the Fillmore District and Western Addition. Courtesy of Majeid Crawford New Community Leadership Foundation Board Member Daniel Landry, Board Member At Large Tonya Jones, Executive Director Hugh Gregory, President Jameel Patterson and Communications Director Majeid Crawford The New Community Leadership Foundation has become a part of the effort to turn the Fillmore Heritage Center at 1300 Fillmore St., the site of a former Yoshi’s sushi bar, into a community hub. “This space is one of the last developments on Fillmore Street that could undo the past damage of the redevelopment agency,” NCFL Communications Director Majeid Crawford said. Crawford’s fight to bring back the culture is not just for the betterment of the community — it is also personal. His great uncle, Henry Noyd, played the saxophone at Bop City. His father, Leslie Crawford, also played the saxophone, but had to go to France to perform because the local clubs had been bulldozed, Crawford said. His father never returned to the city; he died after battling with drug addiction. “My dad must have been heartbroken,” Crawford said. “He should have been playing with his uncle at Bop City.” Courtesy of Majeid Crawford New Community Leadership Foundation Communications Director Majeid Crawford's dad, Leslie Crawford, playing the saxophone at Tamalpais High School in Mill Valley The NCLF held rallies late in 2017, submitted letters to the city and created a 10-point community benefit plan to provide guidance on what would be best for the Fillmore Heritage Center. On Wednesday, the city reached out to the NCLF to begin further discussions of the site, which has left Crawford with a sense of optimism months after a city panel rejected every bid for the site. “I’m very excited. This is the most excited I’ve felt for the Fillmore in a long time,” he said.
Read more at: https://www.bisnow.com/san-francisco/news/neighborhood/fillmores-fight-to-bring-back-black-culture-85314?utm_source=MorningBrief&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20180223_philadelphia_morningbrief&be=liveplug1%40gmail.com?utm_source=CopyShare&utm_medium=Browser
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