{"id":7624,"date":"2023-03-02T16:52:53","date_gmt":"2023-03-02T16:52:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/?p=7624"},"modified":"2023-03-02T16:52:53","modified_gmt":"2023-03-02T16:52:53","slug":"the-dorr-street-project-history-the-perfect-gift","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/2023\/03\/02\/the-dorr-street-project-history-the-perfect-gift\/","title":{"rendered":"The Dorr Street Project — \u201cHistory the Perfect Gift\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"By Robert Smith, President, African American Legacy Project
\n<\/em>Guest Column<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cWalk like you have 3000 ancestors behind you.\u201d\u00a0 — African Proverb<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It was always a sense of community, a sense of pride and a sense of purpose. Losing the Dorr Street Corridor in the \u201c1970\u2019s\u201d sometimes feels like \u2026we lost<\/em> the biggest part of us\u201d<\/em> The Dorr Street Corridor was after all<\/em> the central thesis for African American life in this community.<\/p>\n

The Dorr Street Corridor was\u2026 the very best of us.\u00a0 Most of our primary businesses, organizations and institutions were located on, near or … adjacent to Dorr Street.\u00a0\u00a0 Clearly, the Dorr Street Corridor served as the pulse\/hub\/nerve center connecting neighborhoods who were dependent upon the area [the corridor] for their primary \u201cgoods and services.\u201d<\/p>\n

In reality, the Dorr Street Corridor also served smaller towns like Fremont, Fostoria, Port Clinton, Gibsonburg and other regional communities with smaller African American populations like Monroe, MI.<\/p>\n

Fifty plus years later Toledo\u2019s African American community is still reeling from the dissolution of Dorr Street.\u00a0\u00a0 The complete loss of its economic vitality and to date limited opportunities to develop jobs and create and\/or pursue generational wealth are footnotes to what some may view as\u00a0 historical apathy.<\/p>\n

On Monday, February 6, 2023 residents and former residents of the Dorr Street Corridor gathered to share their memoires, commitment and excitement as The African American Legacy Project unveiled its Dorr Street Project. The Dorr Street Project – quoting legendary jazz pianist Horace Silver \u2013 is a Song to Our Fathers<\/em>. The Dorr Street Project is also a collection of love letters to future generations.<\/p>\n

The Dorr Street Project is a volunteer-driven effort designed with the expressed intent of telling the story of how this community evolved. \u00a0The Dorr Street Project celebrates those who came before us with the hope of stimulating both young and old to search for the intersect where investment meets opportunity.<\/p>\n

We want to ensure future generations understand the possibilities. We want them to walk with a confidence, work with pride and purpose as they begin to imagine what their futures could be. We want them to \u201cwalk like they have 3,000 ancestors behind them \u2013 to be inspired by the past and not fear the future. We believe \u2013 through their own history \u2013 these young people will understand success is inside of them and not necessarily in another zip code.<\/p>\n

For far too long a young person\u2019s success has been measured by how far they move away from home.\u00a0 Good or bad, we\u2019ve actually promoted that kind of thinking for a while now.<\/p>\n

Sadly, there are several generations of young men and women who can\u2019t imagine rows and city blocks of African American businesses, organizations and cultural symbols who directly catered to, influenced or stimulated\u00a0 the residents of this community. While there has been some recent activity, decades have passed since opportunities have presented themselves to create – have access to the tools to create – or consider creating generational wealth.<\/p>\n

Just as importantly, more than 50 years have passed since there was any substantive which would point to the existence of a once vibrant community. Today, the corridor is a vacuum — a shell of itself. Our goal is to collect, develop and share information regarding Toledo\u2019s African American community \u2013 most specifically \u2013 the Dorr Street Corridor to help future generations understand the possibilities. We want them to walk with a confidence work with a pride and purpose as they begin to imagine what their futures could be. We want them to \u201cwalk like they have 3,000 ancestors behind them \u2013 to be inspired by the past and not fear the future.<\/p>\n

We want them to know the story of Mr. James Billups who owned an operated his own full line appliance center both servicing and selling new and used equipment. We want them to know Mr. Billups Fix-All Appliance aka Black Giant Appliance contributed to the economic vitality of the community while growing and sustaining his family.\u00a0 We want them to know about Mr. Jim Cobham the owner of multiple McDonalds restaurants and how used his platform McDonalds who used his platform to give jobs and \u00a0take on a serious leadership role in the community<\/p>\n

It is incumbent upon us to leave a legacy for [inspire] succeeding generations.\u00a0 It is important to tell our story, lest we forget. We are interviewing residents and past residents recording their stories to share with the community. In April, we will unveil a 10\u2019 by 10\u2019 map [permanent display] where residents will be able to visit the Legacy Project to register and record their first family home. During our Juneteenth celebration we will host the Gunckel\/Washington\/Roosevelt reunion honoring and celebrating those students and educators who whose lives were very much intwined in the Dorr Street Legacy.<\/p>\n

Get involved our journey would be incomplete without your footprint. We want to paint a complete picture of our wins and losses, joys and sorrows and in the interim, we want to utilize our history so our community can begin to think differently about its future. We want use our history to teach our kids the importance of developing a spirit of cooperation across community. We want to use our history to begin to reimagine what our community\u2019s future can be? \u00a0What want to use our history to remind us of what can be. What want to use our history as the NorthStar to guide subsequent generations. It is -after all –\u00a0 the perfect gift to the future,<\/p>\n

For more information on how to get involved in the Dorr Street Project call 419-720-4369<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Robert Smith, President, African American Legacy Project Guest Column \u201cWalk like you have 3000 ancestors behind you.\u201d\u00a0 — African Proverb It was always a sense of community, a sense of pride and a sense of purpose. Losing the Dorr Street Corridor in the \u201c1970\u2019s\u201d sometimes feels like \u2026we lost the biggest part of us\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7620,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,18,17],"tags":[],"wf_post_folders":[23],"class_list":["post-7624","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cover_story","category-headline","category-local"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7624","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7624"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7624\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7626,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7624\/revisions\/7626"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7620"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7624"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7624"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7624"},{"taxonomy":"wf_post_folders","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wf_post_folders?post=7624"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}