Long past heyday, oldest black Ala. city in peril (Niggers screwed place up)

[Cherokeescot]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090525/...red_black_city

HOBSON CITY, Ala. – The cafes, the school and the roller rink are long gone from Alabama's oldest black city. Empty homes and businesses line the narrow streets.

Hobson City no longer has a police or fire department, and weeds have overgrown the oldest part of the cemetery and a park in this small town that once thrived as a rarity: a place where black people were in charge in the midst of the Jim Crow South.

Now, with the town on the verge of dying, preservationists have put the east Alabama landmark on the critical list. The Alabama Historical Commission this month included the community of 878 people on its annual inventory of "Places in Peril."

The commission's list typically includes historic structures, such as old homes and abandoned theaters. This year it takes in an entire town that in recent decades has seen its foundation collapse.

Incorporated in 1899, Hobson City was formed 12 years after Eatonville, Fla., which calls itself the nation's oldest black city.

In the decades after the Civil War, blacks formed scores of colonies and communities as they migrated to Kansas and Oklahoma and sought independence in locales around the South. Some, like Eatonville and Hobson City, formally incorporated.

"There was a lot of dissatisfaction and alienation among blacks by the 1890s because of the refusal of whites in the South to allow them any real role in civic life," said University of Tennessee history professor Robert J. Norrell, who has written extensively on race relations.

Blacks also were subject to discrimination and abuse by law enforcement. "Together, these created a desire for separate municipalities," Norrell said.

Hobson City's residents created "a thriving municipality, which people at the time said couldn't be done because blacks couldn't govern," said Dorothy Walker, public outreach coordinator with the Alabama Historical Commission. "If it is someday absorbed into another city, it will lose that historic identity."

Roderick Boyd, a handyman and Hobson City resident, worries about his hometown's survival.

"I fear it's gone too far," said Boyd, 49.

A two-mile-long sliver about 60 miles east of Birmingham, Hobson City is as narrow as a few hundred yards in places. Wedged between two predominantly white cities, Oxford and Anniston, it has a few white residents.

During the 1800s, Walker said, it was an all-black section of Oxford called Mooree Quarter, a possible reference to old slave quarters in the area. Residents were allowed to vote, but whites maintained control.

The racial relationship shifted in the 1890s when the people of Mooree Quarter swayed an election, Walker said. The state had not yet disenfranchised blacks — that wouldn't happen until 1901. So, Walker said, whites petitioned state leaders to de-annex Mooree Quarter.

Kicked out of Oxford, blacks incorporated a new city and named it for Richmond P. Hobson, a white Spanish-American War hero from Alabama who was later elected to Congress. The 1900 Census put the new town's population at 292.

Hobson City grew to about 1,500 people by the mid-1900s, with restaurants, laundries, stores, a skating rink and other businesses. The town was poor, but had a vibrant culture centered on the all-black vocational school.

"It was never a rich town, but it was a good place to raise children," said Mayor Alberta McCrory.

Federal anti-poverty money flowed to Hobson City in the 1960s, and federal aid helped build a modern municipal complex in the 1970s. But in an ironic twist, McCrory said, the end of racial segregation sent the city into a tailspin around the same time.

"Sometimes I think I wouldn't have gone out and done all that marching if I realized how much we were going to lose," said McCrory, 61, who participated in civil rights protests as a young woman.

The all-black Calhoun County Training School became an integrated elementary school in 1972, and fair housing laws meant blacks could live elsewhere. Many who could afford to move away did so, costing Hobson City hundreds of residents.

With nearly one-third of its residents living below the poverty level, the town has only three businesses other than in-home operations: A small print shop, a barber shop and a convenience store.

Industries in nearby towns shut down in the 1980s, costing more jobs. The elementary school was moved from the center of town to the outskirts a few years ago, leaving a shell of a building where kids used to run and play.

City offices are now housed in the old school. The 1970s-era municipal complex stands abandoned. Unable to pay for maintenance, the city left it to the weeds and weather in 2006.

The city still has a police car and a fire truck, but it can't afford officers or firefighters. County deputies handle police calls, and neighboring cities help with fires.

Being tabbed a "Place in Peril" doesn't include any special funding, but McCrory hopes it will increase public awareness of the town's plight.

She dreams of a campaign to raise $1 million in donations, which could lead to federal and state matching grants.

Two civic groups, the Concerned Citizens of Hobson City and the Hobson City Community and Economic Development Corp., will participate in a two-day forum starting May 29 to discuss the town's future. The meeting was spurred in part by the state designation, but leaders have been talking for years about revitalizing the town with little success.

Boyd, a lifelong resident, has a hard time seeing past Hobson City's problems — the poverty, the crime, abandoned buildings, dead businesses. He's just trying to keep his grass cut and stay positive.

"Maybe all the turmoil we're going through now will lead to something," he said.



Seriously this town wasted vast federal dollars and is a trash heap. Niggers cant run anything, even a town they set up. Whats interestign is the assertion that they'd not have participated in the 1960's chimpout if they knew their nigger town would die. Niggers seem to love being special and are really scared aroudn whites.

For laughs google earth the place its a total mess. Go to street view and its a virtual trip to coon town.

[niggersarelowlife]

Worlds oldest niggertown.

"Hobson City no longer has a police or fire department, and weeds have overgrown the oldest part of the cemetery and a park in this small town that once thrived as a rarity: a place where black people were in charge in the midst of the Jim Crow South."

Ya nothing says more that some used 55 gallon drums used as burn barrels so nigger drunks can stand and shuck n jive all day.

[SnowDog]

I say let's help revitalize Hobson City. We could ship them some replacement coons.

[Alucard]

Niggers + Alabama heat and humidity = mega stench

[niggersarelowlife]

Here is a big question some are missing. Here we have a nigger run town. Nigger run business. Nigger run this, nigger run that, YET the niggers still FAILED. So now we have a nigger be HNIC to run this country! How fucked up is that.

[nutnice]

Niggers are experts at ruining towns and then asking for handouts.

[guerraracial]

Niggers are experts at ruining towns and then asking for handouts.

Well, not to quibble, but they started with towns, worked their way up to cities--Detroit, Gary, Camden--are starting on states, but unfortunately skipped a step and now we have one in charge of the country. Nigger leaders + Majority Nigger (or Nigger Lover populations)= Disaster Areas.

Demographics is destiny: Places with large nigger populations will end up destroyed. Language doesn't matter--Senegal, speaking French and African "languages" is as screwed up as Jersey City, New Jersey. Years spent as colonies or as slaves doesn't matter--the oldest black "nation" on the planet, Haiti, is one of the worst. The only thing all these places have in common is lots of niggers.

[ANH]

Everytime a nigger gets elected to public office all the libtards cream their jeans over what "prooooogress" it is (even as they start to check out the real estate ads). The elected nigger brings more niggers on board since niggers are what they are. The presence of niggers in the government, police and court systems emboldens the street niggers to ramp up their TNB. Then the niggers invariably screw everything up and drive all humans out, accelerating the pace of destruction and leading to complete collapse after which they beg YT for a handout while simultaneously blaming their incompetence on "raycizzim". This sad farce is now being played out on a national scale.

[Toby Be Good Nigga]

No suprise here.
Honestly, niggers have never been able to take care of themselves. I can't think of one place on earth that is run by niggers that is not a shithole.

Like someone mentioned above, and to think that one of these apes is in charge of the United States now.
Not only a nigger, but a radical one.
Yeah, the election of Lil' Black Obambo was a historical day, too bad it's going to make history the same way Haiti did when it was taken over by these beasts.

[Wodie Champ]

Well, not to quibble, but they started with towns, worked their way up to cities--Detroit, Gary, Camden--are starting on states, but unfortunately skipped a step and now we have one in charge of the country. Nigger leaders + Majority Nigger (or Nigger Lover populations)= Disaster Areas.

Demographics is destiny: Places with large nigger populations will end up destroyed. Language doesn't matter--Senegal, speaking French and African "languages" is as screwed up as Jersey City, New Jersey. Years spent as colonies or as slaves doesn't matter--the oldest black "nation" on the planet, Haiti, is one of the worst. The only thing all these places have in common is lots of niggers.

dead on. Wherever groids become a large segment of the population, the place goes downhill, crime goes up, vandalism and trash litter the streets. Once groids get themselves into the government due to the groids actually voting and electing groids, the place dies. It happens every single time....South Africa, Haiti, Senegal, Every Apefreakin nation, Detroit, etc.