Elizabeth and William Brown moved into their Laney-Walker Boulevard home more than 50 years ago. They chose to stay and raise their children in the neighborhood when many were leaving. Mr. Brown's grandmother paid $250 for the house in 1891. JONATHAN ERNST/STAFF

District suffers slow demise

Web posted June 18, 2000

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By Justin Martin
Staff Writer

The polished shoes and pressed shirts of black businessmen once filled the Laney-Walker neighborhood. So did the laughter of schoolchildren. There was a bustle along these brick facades, a vibrant pulse to this community.

Not now.

Walk down many streets in the neighborhood and you'll find tired homes with sagging, rusted roofs, empty window frames and hinges that long ago lost their grasp on their doors.

The fractured pavement on most street corners is littered with broken brown glass and filthy foil wrappers. Front lawns display dead weeds to passers-by. The buildings are vacant. Many of the houses seem as hollow and papery as cracked peanut shells.

It is cemetery quiet.

The collapse of this once-vibrant hamlet often is blamed on the racial integration of the 1950s and the riots of 1970. But many people say poor code enforcement, an abundance of absentee landlords and the local government's failure to address the needs of the inner city are just as guilty in the near death of this community.

``I tell people all the time: Don't blame the government, we did it to ourselves,'' said Margaret Armstrong, a former city councilwoman and a longtime neighborhood resident and activist. ``All the people of quality moved out, and they never came back.

The Lenox Theater once anchored the corner of Ninth and Gwinnett streets. It opened in 1921 and was in business until the early '70s. SPECIAL

``Integration came, people chose to go somewhere else, and that left a void here. It allowed people to go, and they went. ... Those who owned the houses, they came in and collected the rent, but they never reinvested. Those of us who remained watched it all fall apart.''

When residents left for places such as west Augusta, Martinez and Evans, the black dollar - the foundation of the inner-city economy - went with them.

Money that once circulated through Gwinnett Street businesses began to flow freely to Washington Road, Broad Street and beyond, and it never came back.

So the people moved out, the businesses went bust, and the riots of 1970 burned away much of the rest.

``Many of the businesses didn't come back,'' said Elizabeth Brown. ``There wasn't much to come back to.''

Fredricka Bohler was the manager of her twin brother Popsy's dry-cleaning business at the corner of 13th Street and Laney-Walker Boulevard. Around the time of this undated photo, the area thrived. SPECIAL

Not around here, where 60 percent of houses are classified substandard by Housing and Neighborhood Development charts; where almost 50 percent of people 25 and older never finished high school; where 44 percent of the neighborhood lives below the poverty line.

``People moved out and the property values didn't hold, a lot of property owners died, a lot moved north, and in the process there seemed to be an awful lot of people who inherited property who lived in other states and never came to Augusta,'' said George Patty, who served as the city's director of community development from 1985 to 1996. ``The neighborhood had its share of slumlords: People went in and bought property off the auction block for pennies on the dollar. Some bought 100 or 200 properties.''

In the 10 years Mr. Patty spent as director of the community development department, hundreds of homes in the Laney-Walker neighborhood were rehabilitated.

``It was piecemeal, but if we hadn't done that, the problem would be 10 times worse than it is now,'' he said.

Mr. Patty, who has worked in planning for 30 years, is now the executive director of the Augusta-Richmond County Planning Commission.

Click on image for larger version. STAFF

The Browns - William, a teacher, and Elizabeth, a nurse - could have moved out like many of their friends and family did, but they chose to stay and raise their children in the house Mr. Brown's grandmother paid $250 for in 1891.

The Browns moved in the day they married more than 50 years ago, and from their front porch watched the slow, painful demise of the neighborhood around them.

Ninth, 10th and 11th streets once were homes for doctors, lawyers, bankers, teachers and others just like the Browns.

There were busy restaurants that sold the best 10-cent hamburgers around and dance halls where people say the sound of shoes shuffling on wooden floors seemed as loud as the music from the record players. There were nightclubs where blues legend B.B. King came to town and singer Ray Charles played late into the evening.

THE HEART OF black Augusta pulsated at the corner of Ninth and Gwinnett. It was anchored by the Lenox Theater, the Penny Savings & Loan Investment Co. and the Pilgrim Health & Life Insurance Co.

There were dozens of restaurants: The Friendship Lunch Room, Joe's Cafe, Chin's restaurant, Johnson's Cafe, Wilk's Lunch Room, Ward's Bakery, Scott's Barbecue Pit, Tiajuana's, the Paramount Cafe.

There was plenty of entertainment: DeSoto's Billiards Parlor, the Grand Terrace Club, the Top Hat Tavern, the Del Mar Casino, Charlie Reid's Bowling Lanes, the After 6 Club.

The Lenox Theater's grand facade no longer dominates Ninth Street. In its place are an empty lot and almost-empty storefronts. JONATHAN ERNST/STAFF

There was Gepfert's drugstore, which some residents say had the best ice cream parlor in the area, and the Cozy Corner grille. The Cozy Corner, it has been said, was the best place for the young women to meet the young men.

This community had the Red Star Hotel, Kenner's Groceries, Wong's Groceries, Hollywood Clothiers, William's Fish Market, Gwinnett Pharmacy, B.L. Dent Furniture Co., Alan's Department Store ...

``You had businesses of all types,'' said Quincy Robertson, 65, a retired banker who came to Augusta by way of Fort Gordon in 1957. ``You could get, probably, anything you wanted back then.''

In the mid-1950s and early 1960s, U.S. Census reports show more than 11,000 people called this neighborhood home.

But by the 1970s, fewer than 6,500 people remained. Today, it is estimated that roughly 7,000 people live in the section bordered by Seventh and 12th streets and by Laney-Walker Boulevard and Walton Way.

``There were places you could go and enjoy yourself; you felt safe. You knew everybody,'' Mrs. Brown said. ``It's not the same anymore.''

Not here, where faded signs and forgotten billboards rule the day and the threat of crime runs rampant through the night.

There was a time when Mrs. Brown would walk to the grocery store or to church or to see a friend.

Not now.

A FEW YEARS AGO, Mrs. Brown, 70, and Mr. Brown, 75, installed wrought-iron bars on their windows. Mrs. Brown said she makes sure to keep her doors locked at all times.

``You just don't know anymore,'' she said. ``You don't know.''

He said the individuals who inherited the houses and lived somewhere else didn't care about the properties because the rent potential simply wasn't there.

``People were getting $100 or $150 a month in rent,'' he said. ``If they spent $20,000 on rehab, they might get $200 a month in rent. It just wasn't worth it to them.''

IF LANEY-WALKER is again to become a vital cog in Augusta's economic wheel, Mr. Patty and other community development experts say it will be through a combination of public and private investments and a push by city leaders to improve the area's transportation and education systems.

Armed with a three-year, $30 million economic development grant from the state, the Augusta Neighborhood Improvement Corp. is trying to stop the slide and restore Laney-Walker to its former glory.

The nonprofit development agency, a dream team of bankers and business professionals assembled by Mayor Bob Young, already has designated nearly half of this year's $10 million installment to help rebuild the neighborhood.

Last year, when the formation of the group was announced, the stated mission was to create and implement housing and economic development projects for the benefit of Augusta's low- and moderate-income residents.

Standing outside a condemned home on 10th Street last July, Mr. Young proclaimed: ``This is a historic day in a historic and often overlooked section of our city ... Bringing focus to our work will allow us to help more people and recreate the vitality of our inner-city neighborhoods.

``I want the people in the Laney-Walker neighborhood to know that we have come here to work, not to talk,'' he said.

According to its economic development plan, the Augusta Neighborhood Improvement Corp. chose the Laney-Walker neighborhood because it is one of the oldest inner-city neighborhoods and it had some of the greatest needs.

An all-too-uncommon sight in the Laney-Walker area is this neatly kept row of houses at the corner of Hopkins and Harrison streets. JONATHAN ERNST/STAFF

Charles A. DeVaney, the group's interim executive director, has said retail outlets, restaurants and a drugstore are badly needed.

``In addition, the streetscape must be improved in order to attract new businesses and home owners,'' Mr. DeVaney, a former mayor, stated in the group's economic development plan presented last month. ``These components should bring new economic life to this area, thereby increasing the tax digest and bringing new job opportunities.''

AS PART OF THE PROJECT, the Augusta Neighborhood Improvement Corp. wants to target Laney-Walker for new housing, rehabilitated housing and strict code enforcement.

``It took years for the problem to develop, and it will take years for the problem to be solved,'' Mr. Patty said. ``It is such a massive project, they've just got to get started. Nothing is going to be an overnight success.''

Some residents, including Mrs. Armstrong, are skeptical of ever seeing the fruition of these promises.

``Let's just say Augusta has a way of getting money in the name of Laney-Walker but that money always seems to find its way out to somewhere else,'' Mrs. Armstrong said.

But there are others, such as 83-year old Luvenia Pearson, who think the neighborhood can be restored.

``I think it can,'' said Mrs. Pearson, who in 1949 opened the first state-certified black school of cosmetology in Georgia. ``I think if they fix up the houses, fix up the businesses, repair the streets, it can be restored.''

Mrs. Pearson, who founded Luvenia's Beauty Salon, has lived in the Laney-Walker neighborhood for more than 60 years. Like the Browns and so many others, she has had a front-row seat from which to watch the neighborhood's collapse.

``This used to be a very vibrant neighborhood,'' Mrs. Pearson said. ``It was, it was, it was.''

Reach Justin Martin at (706) 823-3552.