Dr. Roslyn Clark Artis, President and CEO Columbia, South Carolina

National Park Service awards $16.2M to help preserve African American civil rights history

Courtesy of Benedict College

Following a tour of Hinchliffe Stadium in Paterson, New Jersey, National Park Service (NPS) Director ChuckĀ SamsĀ announced the award of $16,247,500Ā in African American CivilĀ Rights grants. Listed as aĀ National Historic Landmark, Hinchcliffe Stadium isĀ one of a few surviving Negro League baseball stadiumsĀ and previously received an African American Civil Rights Grant inĀ 2018. This yearsā€™ awards will benefit 44Ā projects in 15Ā states and supportĀ the continued preservation ofĀ sites and history related to the African American struggle for equality.

ā€œThe African American Civil Rights grants are critical to helping preserve and interpret a more comprehensive narrative of the people, places, and events associated with African American Civil Rights movement.Ā Sites like Hinchliffe Stadium are rare, and they provide a tangible reminder of this complex history. It was exciting to see the ongoing preservation work at a site that bore witness to more than 20 baseball Hall of Famers in its time and has inspired generations to follow in the footsteps of their heroes,ā€Ā said NPS Director ChuckĀ Sams.Ā 

The African American Civil Rights grants fund a variety of projects from rehabilitation to oral history documentation, in coordination with state, Tribal,Ā localĀ government, and nonprofit partners.Ā The rehabilitation project at Hinchliffe Stadium, was funded in part by this grant program and is expected to reopen to the public later this year.

This yearsā€™ grants will support the preservationĀ ofĀ theĀ Masjid al-Ansar in Miami, the first mosque in Florida, which records the story of how Black Muslims were instrumental in the civil rights campaigns in the Deep South; the Schooner Clotilda in Mobile, Alabama, the last known ship to import enslaved Africans to the United States; and in Tulsa, Oklahoma, funds willĀ help tell the rich stories of the African American struggle for equality throughĀ oral histories of Selmaā€™s foot soldiers andĀ those with personal and family connectionsĀ to Greenwood Avenue or ā€œBlack Wall Streetā€.

Applications for $21.7Ā million in FY2022 funding will be available in lateĀ summerĀ 2022. Learn more about the African American Civil Rights grant program, and how toĀ apply for future grants on NPS.gov.

African American Civil Rights Grant Awards

State City Project Grantee Award
Alabama Birmingham Preservation, Restoration, and Repair of St Paul United Methodist Church St Paul United Methodist Church $500,000
Alabama Birmingham The BBRM Permanent Exhibit at the Carver Theatre Birmingham Black Radio Museum $50,000
Alabama Hope Hull Tankersley Rosenwald School: Stabilization and Exterior Rehabilitation Auburn University $499,799
Alabama Mobile Stabilization and Preservation of the Schooner Clotilda (1Ba704), the Last-known Slave Ship to Import Enslaved Africans to the United States. Alabama Historical Commission $469,500
Alabama Montgomery The Rehabilitation of Mount Zion A.M.E. Zion Church Memorial Annex Mount Zion Center Foundation, Inc. $500,000
Alabama Montgomery Freedom Rides Museum Interior Exhibit Plan ā€“ Phase 3 Alabama Historical Commission $50,000
Alabama Montgomery The Civil Engineering of the Civil Rights Movement in Montgomery, Alabama: The Planned Destruction of a Prosperous African American Community City of Montgomery $50,000
Alabama Selma Memory and the March: Oral Histories with Selmaā€™s Foot Soldiers Auburn University $46,588
Alabama Selma Preservation of Endangered Historic Brown Chapel AME Church Historic Brown Chapel AME Church Preservation Society Inc $500,000
Alabama Selma Critical Systems and Accessibility Upgrades to Historic Tabernacle Baptist Church Historic Tabernacle Baptist Church Selma AL Legacy Foundation, Inc. $500,000
Alabama Selma Rehabilitation of the Historic Sullivan BuildingĀ for use as a Community and Culture Center Selma Center for Nonviolence, Truth & Reconciliation $499,521
District of Columbia Black Women Suffrage in Washington, DC: A Context Study DC Preservation League $50,000
Florida Miami Rehabilitating, Nominating, and Establishing the Black Muslim Contribution to American Civil Rights through Masjid al-Ansar in Miami, the First Mosque in Florida The East West Foundation $444,165
Florida Miami Phase 2 Rehabilitation of Ace Theater, a ā€œJim Crowā€ Theater Ace Theater Foundation, Inc. $500,000
Florida Saint Augustine Exhibition on the St. Augustine Civil Rights Movement and Wade-ins St. Johns Cultural Council, Inc $50,000
Georgia Americus Rehabilitation of the Historic Campbell AME Chapel Historic Campbell Chapel Restoration Project Inc $499,128
Georgia Americus Rehabilitation of the Historic Americus Colored Hospital Phase 3 Americus Sumter County Movement Remembered Committee, Inc $499,488
Georgia Atlanta Rehabilitation and Preservation of the Historic West Hunter Street Baptist Church Phase 5, Home Church of Dr. Ralph David Abernathy Ralph David Abernathy III Foundation, Inc. $499,232
Georgia Atlanta English Avenue School Emergency Stabilization Atlanta Preservation Center Inc. 401 $500,000
Georgia Atlanta Rehabilitation of Residence of Grace Towns Hamilton Preserve Black Atlanta, Inc. $500,000
Georgia Atlanta Rehabilitation of Residence of George Alexander Towns Preserve Black Atlanta $500,000
Georgia Marietta Rehabilitation of the Historic Girard Elementary School WGS 3.0 Inc $499,488
Georgia Woodville Rehabilitation of the Georgia B. Williams Nursing Home Georgia B. Williams Nursing Home Inc. $469,014
Illinois Chicago Rehabilitation of theĀ BronzevilleĀ Historic Wabash YMCA The Renaissance Collaborative, Inc. $436,375
Kansas Topeka St. Markā€™s Church Rehabilitation ā€“ Phase 2 St. Markā€™s AME Church $489,800
Kentucky Louisville Quinn Chapel AME Church Stabilization ā€“ Phase 3 Louisville Jefferson County Metropolitan Government $500,000
Kentucky Russellville Documenting the Places and Civil Rights Contributions of Alice Allison Dunnigan, the First Woman of African American Heritage to Cover White House, Congressional and Supreme Court Press Briefings Historic Russellville Inc. DBA Seek Museum $23,669
Maryland St. Leonard Witnesses ofĀ Wallville: Documenting a Rural Southern Maryland Community through Oral Histories Maryland Historical Trust/JPPM $49,742
Mississippi Holly Springs Rehabilitation of Carnegie Auditorium on Mississippi Industrial College Campus Rust College $500,000
Mississippi Jackson The Riverside Hotel Rehabilitation Project Mississippi Heritage Trust $499,500
North Carolina Oxford Rehabilitation of Mary Potter School Shop Building National Mary Potter Club, Inc. $500,000
North Carolina Raleigh Rehabilitation of Leonard Hall Shaw University $500,000
New Jersey Atlantic City Rehabilitation of the Indiana Avenue Firehouse City of Atlantic City $500,000
Oklahoma Tulsa Masonry Repair for the Historic Greenwood ā€œBlack Wall Streetā€ Buildings Greenwood Community Development Corporation $412,465
Oklahoma Tulsa Oral Histories from Greenwood, Tulsa, and the 13 Oklahoma Black Townships Greenwood Community Development Corporation $43,365
South Carolina Charleston Mapping Charlestonā€™s Black Burial Grounds Preservation Society of Charleston $50,000
South Carolina Columbia The Alston House Rehabilitation Project Magnolia Blossom SC $318,645
South Carolina Columbia Rehabilitation of the Booker T. Washington High School Auditorium Building University of South Carolina $500,000
South Carolina Columbia Morgan Hall Rehabilitation Project Phase 2 Benedict College $500,000
South Carolina Georgetown Historic Sandy Island School House Rehabilitation Georgetown County Government $408,440
South Carolina West Columbia Interior Rehabilitation and Adaptive Reuse of the Former Lakeview School Brookland Center for Community Economic Change $499,576
Tennessee Memphis Collins Chapel Rehabilitation Collins Chapel Christian Methodist Episcopal Church $500,000
Tennessee Memphis Memphis Heritage Trail: Youth and Civil Rights Summer Camp City of Memphis-Division of Housing and Community Development $50,000
Virginia Richmond Stabilization of the Cumberland County Pine Grove Rosenwald School AMMD Pine Grove Project $290,000

Congress appropriated funding for theĀ African American CivilĀ Rights Grant ProgramĀ in FY2021Ā through theĀ Historic Preservation FundĀ (HPF). The HPF uses revenue from federal oil and gas leases on the Outer Continental Shelf, assisting withĀ a broad range of preservation projects without expending tax dollars,Ā with the intent to mitigate the loss of a nonrenewable resource to benefit the preservation of other irreplaceable resources.

Established in 1977, the HPF is authorized at $150 million per year through 2023 and has provided more than $2.7Ā billion in historic preservation grants to states, Tribes, local governments, and nonprofit organizations. Administered by the NPS, HPF funds may be appropriated by Congress to support a variety of historic preservation projects to help preserve the nationā€™s cultural resources.