On Martin Luther King Day, police called in to stop demolition of garages at historic house where civil-rights documentarian lived

is like pissing into the wind. Of course when it's time to shutter a restaurant, or cite a landlord they'll be right over.

How important is it to preserve the garages where, for a brief part of their existence, a filmmaker kept his cars?

Should the race of a property owner relative to the race of the people in the surrounding area have any bearing whatever on what’s permitted to be built or demolished on the property? This is what zoning and historic preservation laws are for. I’m sure you could see why using race as a factor for zoning permission is dangerous and morally abhorrent.

Much like a rose, a NIMBY by any other name is . . .

So the threshold for a "Notable Black Historic Site" is so low that the garage of a property where a black guy that made a movie lived for a short period is now considered??

The only folks that think this is a "notable black historic site" are those that live within one street and don't want to see new development. Outside those that love ten yards from the property no one has ever heard of this place. Making a movie does not make the home you reside in historic. This is not to say there is some value to preserving the property but the historic argument is not close to being valid.

Henry Hampton's seminal, crucial work lives in the world, in our hearts and minds, and not in those garages. It bothers me that the neighborhood is not being more proactive about the dilapidated house, just a few blocks over, where Malcolm X once lived. The Highland Park/Fort Hill section of Roxbury is, and has been pretty mixed racially so I also disagree that people pushing against the development are predominantly Black. Many of the leaders in this community are white - and the loudest voices are the most privileged: relatively affluent Black and white homeowners which, in reality, is only truly representative of a tiny percentage of the Roxbury population.

If attacking the person, not the development, is the final and best argument that the neighborhood can come up with, then the neighborhood doesn't have an argument. The developer in question is a resident of the neighborhood, has been for at least two years (like many of us, not a Roxbury native but a transplant, Eeka), is part of a mixed race family (like many of us, Eeka), and has been agonizingly willing to work with the neighborhood. He's agreed to create a scholarship for kids from the abutting Hale School and establish an artist-in-residence program. He has been more than civil and accommodating - especially given the vicious and excessively inappropriate personal attacks he has endured.

The public move to not approve the zoning variances necessary for this development lost by a vote of 27 - 33 with a handful of abstentions. I'd be interested to see the same vote taken anonymously, if it wasn’t the first time. Many people in the neighborhood in favor of this, and other developments, view the efforts to squash developments as elitist and retrograde but are afraid to speak up because of the vicious personal attacks that Winston, and other developers, endure. If you’re a homeowner who’s going to want to make any changes to your property that will require neighborhood approval, you’re going to keep your mouth shut. Meanwhile, if you're in the "right" group of residents, you can basically build any sort of poorly designed and unsustainably built monstrosity that you like with the blessing of the small but extremely vocal groupthink mob in "power", i.e., able to attend meetings and thus set agendas.

The scores of working class renters forced out of this neighborhood due to the gentrification of it, would be delighted at the prospect of more housing here if it meant they didn't have to move to Randolph or Brockton. More workforce housing is what the neighborhood and City needs and if the leaders against this development were serious about a commitment to social justice, I think they’d be working harder with developers to house all the people who have been getting forced out rather than ignoring them to save some garages.

If attacking the person, not the development, is the final and best argument that the neighborhood can come up with, then the neighborhood doesn't have an argument. Henry Hampton's seminal, crucial work lives in the world, in our hearts and minds, and not in those garages. It bothers me that the neighborhood is not being more proactive about the dilapidated house, just a few blocks over, where Malcolm X once lived. The Highland Park/Fort Hill section of Roxbury is, and has been pretty mixed racially so I also disagree that people pushing against the development are predominantly Black. Many of the leaders in this community are white - and the loudest voices are the most privileged: relatively affluent homeowners which, in reality, is truly representative of only a tiny percentage of the Roxbury population.

The developer in question is a resident of the neighborhood, has been for at least two years, is part of a mixed race family, and has been agonizingly willing to work with the neighborhood. He's agreed to create a scholarship for kids from the abutting Hale School and establish an artist-in-residence program. He has been more than civil and accommodating - especially given the vicious and excessively inappropriate personal attacks he has endured.

The public move to not approve the zoning variances necessary for this development lost by a vote of 27 - 33 with a handful of abstentions. I'd be interested to see the same vote taken anonymously, if it wasn’t the first time. Many people in the neighborhood in favor of this, and other developments, view the efforts to squash developments as elitist and retrograde but are afraid to speak up because of the vicious personal attacks that Winston, and other developers, endure. If you’re a homeowner who’s going to want to make any changes to your property that will require neighborhood approval, you’re going to keep your mouth shut as far as expressing an opinion contrary to that of the hivemind. Meanwhile, if you're in the "right" group of residents, you can build any sort of poorly designed and unsustainably built monstrosity that you like with the blessing of the relatively small but extremely vocal group in "power", i.e., able to attend meetings and thus set agendas.

The scores of working class renters forced out of this neighborhood due to the gentrification of it, would be delighted at the prospect of more housing here if it meant they didn't have to move to Randolph or Brockton. More workforce housing is what the neighborhood and City needs and if the community people against this development were serious about a commitment to social justice, I think they’d be working harder with developers to house all the people who have been getting forced out rather than ignoring them to save some garages.

We (the predecessors in title) got permission to tear down the garages in 2017. When we sold the property to them that permission ran with the land.

The connection the garages have to Blackside, the film company founded by Hampton, is at some point the garages served as a repository for film footage for Hamptons work. Blackside was by all measure, a provocative film company that did in fact reframe our understanding of the Civil Rights movement in America. While that reframing and insightful perspective can be traced throughout Hampton's work, it's most evident in the body of work that produced Eyes on the Prize.

That's what we know.

Here's my truth, as a Black man, with family roots in Roxbury for over 100 years, that's shared with a bunch of folks who live in our neighborhood (Mr. Winston is a new neighbor). Why isn't Black life, culture, history and achievement honored and respected the same way we honor and respect white life, culture, history and achievement?

After Mr. Winston has bulldozed the one physical piece of evidence that can be linked to Black greatness on his property into the ground to make way for his condo project, all we'll have left is the Bond house, the carriage house and his condominium project. Mr. Winston doesn't even want to wait for the Boston Landmarking study to be completed on his property! Or perhaps he has the completed study and hasn't shared it.

Either way, everybody is in the dark regarding the study and here comes the bulldozer!

I gotta say, there is a cruel irony at play here that brings me to the brink of tears every time! Who is the more consequential figure in history: Richard Bond the Architect or Henry Hampton the filmmaker? Hands down I'd say Henry Hampton because he touched more lives and had greater impact on who we are as Americans. It's not selfish to say he had a greater impact on my life and Black life all over the world. And Hampton's impact is not just to Black folks. We're all better off because of a dream.

And how are we preserving that Civil Rights dream? Are we just saving the Bond home and carriage house because each represents an architectural record that must not be lost to history, and oh by the way, a much more consequential figure in history to Balck folks lived there too?

Not sure why Mr. Winston and others commenting on this thread can't you see this is precisely the white supremacy, bias and privilege Hampton fought to address with his work. I can tell you with a very high degree of confidence, the vast majority of his neighbors see it. This is what Byron Rushing warned us all of in his last testimony to the City Council hearing on preservation, that changes to historic preservation tools cannot simply be tagged on to yet another celebration of European anniversaries. To do so would be doing it in a white supremacist way.

This happens to be the crux of the issue: why aren't we saving the entire Hampton homestead, including the garages, which preserves the complete historical record of the property? And some would add, the more consequential part of the property happens to be the garages.

Greg Galer, of Boston Preservation Alliance, insisted in his testimony at the same preservation hearing that Bostonians should be allowed to see themselves in their collective history, and that an equitable preservation landscape “empowers residents to be engaged members of society, encouraging them to see themselves as stewards of a legacy to which they also contribute.”

If the garages are demolished, do we all see ourselves in our collective history? While some may, many others will not.

Boston Landmarks and then Mr. Winston took a wrecking ball to a dream for everybody, that culminated on of all days, MLK day. And sadly, each had a choice.

No, the plaque should read: "White supremacy, bias and privilege triumphs again."

Regretfully,
-RLS