Geography:
The “Black Bottom” was the residential community that existed in the section of Philadelphia known by city planners as “Area 3”, and referred to now as “University City”. The Black Bottom was framed by 33rd and 40th Streets on the east and west, and Lancaster / Powelton and Curie Boulevard (University Avenue) on the north and south. The Black Bottom received its name from its location at the “bottom” of West Philadelphia. It was also a predominantly African American community; hence the name “Black” Bottom. The neighborhood just north of the Black Bottom was known as “Manchua”. Manchua ran from Lancaster / Powelton to 46th Street, and 33rd to 40th Streets. The community east of the Black Bottom was simply called the “Bottom” and it included the area between 40th and 46th Streets, and University Avenue to 46th Street / Fairmont Park. Above the Bottom lay, of course, the “Top”, which encompassed 40th to 63rd Streets, and University Avenue to 46th Street / Fairmont Park. (Palmer, 1999).
Map of Blackbottom Boundaries: This image was taken from the University of Pennsylvania's website and the boundaries of the Black Bottom were marked in red. It shows the University's development circa 1960, which is just a few years prior to the destruction of the Black Bottom community. Pink indicates University buildings that already existed at the time. Darker pink buildings with numbers indicate new University construction. Light blue areas indicate residential and commercial areas within the Black Bottom.
History of Community:
In the late 1800’s a West Philadelphia neighborhood called Greenville was the home of African American families who had been in Philadelphia from the time William Penn imported slaves in 1685. These African American families were a close group whose numbers were dramatically growing in Greenville by the 1900’s. The community, whose population exploded after the First World War (1917), referred to themselves as The Black Bottom Tribe. Thereafter, the neighborhood of Greenville would be referred to locally as The Black Bottom. Another population expansion occurred in the 1950’s when Southern African Americans, many of whom were relatives of current Black Bottom residents, migrated North in search of a better quality of life where they’d be freer from racial segregation and oppression.
The Black Bottom men fought in the Civil War (1864), First World War (1917), Second World War (1940’2), Korean War (1950’s), and Vietnam War (1960’s) to protect their families and community for over one hundred (1864-1964) years. During that time the neighborhood operated as a large extended family with standard practices of ensuring the safety and prosperity of all of its members, particularly its young and its elderly. Unwritten codes of Black Bottom fraternity and allegiance were obeyed with little exception. (Excerpted from City Council Resolution, 1999)
By 1950, the Black Bottom was a dynamic, working-class neighborhood of rowhouses and businesses. The average family had four or more children plus two adults. Many homes were owned by African American families while still more families rented. All homes were occupied – not one was vacant. (Billy Wilson as quoted in “History & Memory of the Black Bottom”) Though the neighborhood was comprised largely of African Americans, with black-owned restaurants, barber shops, stores and markets, there were white merchants who worked and lived in the area as well. The segregation of the times was seen at places like the local movie theatre, the Eureka, where the whites sat on one side and the blacks on the other. Discrimination also excluded the working-poor of the Black Bottom from many occupations. Black Bottom mothers and grandmothers worked as seamstresses, housekeepers, launders and child caretakers of wealthier white families in surrounding areas. It was not uncommon for Black Bottom residents to hold multiple jobs, interspersed with odd jobs where they found them, to provide for their families. The priority of safeguarding the welfare of the family was primary. This was accomplished through the now idealized “village” approach.
Recreation in the Black Bottom was simple: sitting on the front steps of the church chatting with neighbors or singing, children jumping rope and playing with jacks, grandmothers canning, men pitching horseshoes and women getting suited in their Sunday best to go to the movies. Parents didn’t worry about their children and doors were left unlocked.
Community Displacement:
With the construction of a permanent bridge across the Schuylkill River in the early 20th Century, the population of West Philadelphia grew. Many neighborhoods became heavily occupied, as more traffic and people moved into this section of the city. The residents with greater means moved to the suburbs and left the neighborhood filled by transient individuals and black families with low incomes. Many blocks began to deteriorate from decay, neglect, and misuse. Large houses, originally built for one family, were converted into apartments and rooming houses, with owners living outside the area. And though it was made up of predominantly poor, African-American families, it was a safe, close-knit, and thriving community from the early 1900’s until its destruction as part of Philadelphia’s urban renewal efforts.
In 1872, the University of Pennsylvania moved from Center City to West Philadelphia. During World War II, massive infusions of Federal dollars made it possible for the university to be a major contributor to the war effort. Immediately afterwards, the GI Bill paid for thousands to attend the university. The size of Penn exploded after a national peacetime consensus developed during the fifties and sixties to use tax dollars to support basic research and University-based training. Around the same time, the Ivy League was established in 1954 with Penn as one of its eight founding members. With the financial backing of the government and the increasing public recognition they were receiving for both their academics and research efforts, the university was poised as a powerful authority that would have little trouble exerting their authority locally.
The first of five distinct periods of urban redevelopment and residential displacement by public action started with the initiation of the federal urban renewal program in 1949. The primary goal during the period of 1945-1954 was “slum clearance”. Urban renewal was introduced as government’s response to the impediments facing urban redevelopment. Inaugurated as federal program, states adopted corresponding legislation defining the urban renewal process for their cities. Common elements included the designation of an area as blighted, the preparation of a development plan, use of eminent domain for land assembly by the renewal agency, clearance, and marketing of the cleared land. (Koebel, 1996)
The urban renewal program was later criticized as “urban removal” and the “federal bulldozer.” By the early sixties, the civil rights movement and race riots began to call public attention to the destruction, dislocation, and broken promises of urban renewal. (Wilson et al., 1966)
Locally, the Redevelopment Authority of Philadelphia was a corporate body appointed by the major in 1945. Their task was to arrange for the elimination of blighted areas and the acquisition of property by force with eminent domain.
The Housing Act of 1949 stated that the government would pay two-thirds of the net cost uncured by the local authorities in purchasing and cleaning blighted areas. The University of Pennsylvania was able to raze West Philadelphia and displace thousands of people with the governmental financial encouragement. The University of Pennsylvania – with its abundance of resources and prestigious stature – was able to displace thousands of West Philadelphians under the pretense of “urban renewal.”
It has been estimated that 4,496 people were displaced, though some figures cite over 10,000. So close were the members of this community that despite being displaced and scattered by the so-called urban renewal (a.k.a., Negro Removal) efforts of the late 1960’s and 1970’s, they still, to this day, celebrate an annual reunion.
In 1976, six people from the neighborhood founded the Black Bottom Association. In September of that same year, the Association held a dinner party to celebrate their first “family reunion.” More than 100 people attended the affair.
The first Black Bottom Association annual picnic was held during the summer of 1984 at Belmont and Parkside Avenues. Two hundred people, contacted simply by word of mouth, attended the gathering. Many of the families had not seen each other since 1976. To this day, the Black Bottom Association has an annual picnic on the last Sunday of July.
In addition, On March 25th, 1999, the Council of the City of Philadelphia designated the last Sunday of August as Black Bottom Day in Philadelphia, “in fitting tribute to the great history and legacy of this great and historic community.”
Though the families may have been physically displaced, spiritually the former residents of the Black Bottom remain united.
