“It was a nightmare, worse than pictures of a war torn or burned out riot area. Who caused all this?”
– Barbara Perry on returning home to Hayti during Urban Renewal
In the late 1960s, city officials planned to demolish every building in the outlined area except for St. Joseph’s AME church.
R-17 project area in 1950..
..and in 1972
USDA historical aerial photos courtesy of the North Carolina Office of Archives and History; Raleigh, North Carolina
Urban renewal and the Durham Freeway destroyed much and would replace little.
In the end, over 4,000 families and 500 businesses were displaced. The price tag for the destruction of Hayti was $300 million in today’s dollars, three-quarters of which was paid for by the federal government.
But the promise of a renewed Hayti never came.
Interior of Hayti landmark DeShazor’s Beauty College (left), circa 1950. A bulldozer tears down the building on Fayetteville Street that housed the college, 1968 (below).
Courtesy North Carolina Collection, Durham County Libraries
Between 1949-1973, the US government bulldozed 2,500 neighborhoods in 993 American cities through urban renewal. A million people were displaced by the program.
This map shows aerial photographs of two areas of Durham in which homes were demolished from urban renewal, overlaid on top of present-day satellite imagery. Open the legend to toggle the 1955 aerial photographs on and off and see what’s currently in those areas.Created by Tim Stallmann, 2017.
“It was a nightmare, worse than pictures of a war torn or burned out riot area. Who caused all this?”
– Barbara Perry on returning home to Hayti during Urban Renewal
In the late 1960s, city officials planned to demolish every building in the outlined area except for St. Joseph’s AME church.
R-17 project area in 1950..
..and in 1972
USDA historical aerial photos courtesy of the North Carolina Office of Archives and History; Raleigh, North Carolina
Urban renewal and the Durham Freeway destroyed much and would replace little. In the end, over 4,000 families and 500 businesses were displaced. The price tag for the destruction of Hayti was $300 million in today’s dollars, three-quarters of which was paid for by the federal government. But the promise of a renewed Hayti never came.
Interior of Hayti landmark DeShazor’s Beauty College (above), circa 1950. A bulldozer tears down the building on Fayetteville Street that housed the college, 1968 (below).