A Journey Into North Richmond

A 10-part series exploring the history, present and future of North Richmond.

Part 10: A hopeful vision for the future

By: Robert Rogers | August 24, 2011 – 9:00 am

North Richmond knows the blues of economic and social decay, but a brighter day will come – the real question may be when.

Part 9: North Richmond crime, tragedy beyond the stats

By: Robert Rogers | August 17, 2011 – 12:57 pm

The kids walked east on Silver Avenue, tossing back and forth a frayed, half-deflated football. It was the afternoon of March 30, 2011.

Part 8: North Richmond, where the city’s boundaries end

By: Robert Rogers | August 10, 2011 – 2:37 pm

Civic leaders who seriously grapple with the question of how North Richmond can break its ruinous cycle of crime, poverty and decline often come to...

Part 7: North Richmond’s troubled environmental history

By: Robert Rogers | August 3, 2011 – 9:59 am

From the corner of Filbert Street and Chesley Avenue, the unofficial center of North Richmond, a person gets the full sensory onslaught that the community...

Part 6: North Richmond’s unceasing struggle

By: Robert Rogers | July 13, 2011 – 10:05 am

From 2005 to 2010, at least 28 homicides occurred in the county area of North Richmond alone, an area with a population that has averaged...

Part 5: North Richmond man

By: Robert Rogers | July 6, 2011 – 10:01 am

For more than a decade, one man has been the de facto elected representative of the nearly 3,000 residents of unincorporated North Richmond.

Part 4: North Richmond’s moribund housing projects

By: Robert Rogers | June 22, 2011 – 10:16 am

In the 1940s and 1950s, the growth of public housing projects swept across urban America. North Richmond was no exception.

Part 3: North Richmond blues

By: Robert Rogers | June 15, 2011 – 10:00 am

The music scene that emerged in North Richmond featured a strong, bluesy, country twang that represented not only the influx of southerners to the area...

Part 2: North Richmond’s inauspicious beginnings

By: Robert Rogers | June 8, 2011 – 8:00 am

The North Richmond of today emerges from a history marked by bad reputation, bad luck and, often, bad intentions.

Part 1: North Richmond, a neighborhood on the brink

By: Robert Rogers | June 1, 2011 – 2:16 pm

It’s a blend of hope and heartbreak, of promise and peril.