Manhattan's West Village is famously upscale and mostly white now, but in its earliest days, and for nearly four centuries afterward, the community was as Black as Black could be. How did things change so much?
In the 1640s, when the city was under Dutch rule, Manhattan was known as the "Land of the Blacks." The Dutch West India Company gave land to freed and "half-freed" Africans. But when the English took control of the colony, they redrew the racial lines.
They seized the Black-owned land and imposed stricter segregation, displacing Black folks and snatching back the little freedom some had. When New York abolished slavery in 1827, our people went back and got what was theirs.
By the 1850s, the neighborhood was once again predominantly Black and was nicknamed Little Africa. It was a hub of Black culture, with its own banks, schools, and the African Grove Theater. Eventually, folks migrated further uptown to places like San Juan Hill and ultimately, Harlem.
The story of Little Africa is a reminder that we've been here. They've tried many times and in many ways, to make us invisible, but they can’t. It's crucial for us to know, value, and share our history. Especially now.