For once, the Richmond Times-Dispatch has gotten something right, Or, at least, columnist Michael Paul Williams has, but then he usually does.
Williams says that instead of a major, $330 million ballpark and assorted retail, office and condos in Richmond’s Shockoe Bottom, Doug Wilder’s failed National Slavery Museum should be built there.
That makes sense. The area was the second largest slave market int he U.S. next to New Orleans. Thousands of black Africans were shipped in in chains and then auctioned off to plantations in spots farther South such as Alabama and Mississippi. Families were broken. Marriages dissolved as overseers stood by with guns and whips.
This sorry chapter in Virginia’s and Richmond’s history needs to be remembered and commemorated every bit as much as Confederate history is on Monument Avenue, at the museum near VCU’s Medical Center and by the stars and bars hanging next to the Virginia Museum of Art.
Wilder, the cantankerous former Richmond mayor and first Black ever elected to be governor, had backed a National Slavery Museum just off Interstate 95 near Fredericksburg for years. But after seven or eight years of fundraising, the project is bust. In fact, its Website is still soliciting donations even though it is no longer authorized to do so. Characteristically, Wilder can’t be found.
The region’s lack of leadership led to the Triple AAA Richmond Braves bolting to an Atlanta suburb last year. The awful Diamond was just too crappy a place to play and the region did nothing to fix it.
North Carolina real estate company Highwoods Properties wants to put a new stadium in Shockoe Bottom as part of a new, privately-funded complex. But that, too, has issues since parking is already tight or non-existent in the area and it is too near the historic Church Hill neighborhood with its signature Georgian homes.
Williams’ solution is a good one. Put the new stadium somewhere else and put in a slavery museum not far from the old auction blocks and the prison for slaves. The spot is literally right under I-95, a major north-south artery. Many families heading to Disneyworld could stop off and learn something. And as Williams points out, the Fredericksburg plan would have been part of a theme park, as if the tragedy of slavery is anything worth celebrating.
As for the ballpark, rebuild the Diamond. It’s a great location where I-95 and I-64 meet. I’ve always been able to get there easily. Too bad a decent location isn’t available next to the James River. But Williams’ solution is the next best option.
Peter Galuszka
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