A Journey Into North Richmond
North Richmond knows the blues of economic and social decay, but a brighter day will come – the real question may be when.
The kids walked east on Silver Avenue, tossing back and forth a frayed, half-deflated football. It was the afternoon of March 30, 2011.
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 the conclusion that its current political arrangement is untenable – and that the city would fare better if it was annexed to Richmond.
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 has endured for decades.
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 about 2,300 people.
For more than a decade, one man has been the de facto elected representative of the nearly 3,000 residents of unincorporated North Richmond.
In the 1940s and 1950s, the growth of public housing projects swept across urban America. North Richmond was no exception.
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 during World War II, but also other unique geographical and cultural heritages.
The North Richmond of today emerges from a history marked by bad reputation, bad luck and, often, bad intentions.