1969 SPECIAL REPORT: THE ROXBURY EXPERIMENT"
In the early 20th century, Roxbury became home to recent immigrants; a thriving Jewish community developed around Grove Hall, along Blue Hill Avenue, Seaver Street and into Dorchester along Columbia Road. A large Irish population also developed, with many activities centered around then-Dudley Square (now Nubian Square), which just before and following annexation into Boston, became a central location for Roxbury commerce.
Following a massive migration from the South to northern cities in the 1940s and 1950s, Roxbury became the center of the African-American community in Boston. The center of African American residential and social activities in Boston had formerly been on the north slope of Beacon Hill and the South End.
In particular, a riot in response to the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. resulted in stores on Blue Hill Avenue being looted and eventually burned down, leaving a desolate and abandoned landscape which discouraged commerce and business development.
Rampant arson in the 1970s along the Dudley Street corridor also added to the neighborhood’s decline, leaving a landscape of vacant, trash filled lots and burned out buildings. In early April 1987, the original Orange Line MBTA route along Washington Street was closed and relocated to the Southwest Corridor (where the Southwest Expressway was supposed to be built a couple decades before).
More recently, grassroots efforts by residents have been the force behind revitalizing historic areas and creating Roxbury Heritage State Park.
A movement known as the Greater Roxbury Incorporation Project, led by Roxbury residents Andrew Jones. and Curtis Davis, sought to form an independent municipality out of the Roxbury and the Mattapan area.
The project was part of a larger goal to increase the number of services available to residents, but in 1986 Boston Mayor Raymond Flynn rejected the idea.
The area was to be named “Mandela” (after South African activist Nelson Mandela).
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