SOME HISTORY:
The public artwork commemorates the struggle for racial equality in Arlington and the renaming of Route 29,previously named for Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.
The mural adorns a wall on the side of a local store, which was chosen for its location in the historically Black neighborhood of Hall’s Hill, as well as its visibility from the road.
The new name and mural pay tribute to Langston, who was Virginia’s first Black congressional representative and served as the first dean of Howard University’s law school and the first president of Virginia State University.
The mural incorporates places and moments in Arlington’s history of racism and racial progress. The Langston Boulevard Alliance worked with the artist, D.C. native Kaliq Crosby, to include depictions of Arlington’s Freedman’s Village, established after the Civil War, the segregation of the Hall’s Hill neighborhood and the integration of public schools.
“There is a significant piece of the mural that… came [about] during the design process,” Brown said. “The historic John M. Langston School will be included in the mural. It is the school where all of the Hall’s Hill children went before the Stratford School was integrated.”
About a block from the mural, the elementary school for Black children operated until Arlington County closed it in 1966 as part of its desegregation plan. Today it is the Langston-Brown Community Center, which also houses alternative high school programming.
(Credit: Mural information was taken from this article featured in ARLnow.com)
THE CACHE:
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