The heart of Olde Hampton beats again with the opening of the new Mary W. Jackson Neighborhood Center. The new 12,500-square-foot building includes multi-purpose and meeting spaces, a catering kitchen, an indoor basketball court, activity rooms for classes, a small fitness center and covered porches. The program not only accommodates youth, but also caters to a growing aging population. Outdoor amenities include a soccer field, basketball court, future playground, and picnic shelters.
The City named the new center the Mary W. Jackson Neighborhood Center in 2018. Mary W. Jackson, the first African-American female engineer and mathematician to work at NASA, was a long-time resident of Olde Hampton and a direct influence on the lives of countless young people who grew up there.
This historic neighborhood, bounded by Settler’s Landing Road, Armistead Boulevard, West Pembroke and LaSalle Avenues, grew out of the Contraband Camps, formed by former black slaves who were captured by the Union Army during the Civil War. The Army refused to return them to their Confederate masters by defining them as “contraband of war.” The camp was the first self-contained black community in the United States, with residents starting businesses and families. There remains a sense of history and pride in the contraband heritage.
Today, efforts are underway for a larger transformation to knit the Olde Hampton community back together. A proposed urban plan around the new center restores a historic street, reconnects and adjusting placement of the road that originally ran through the center of Grant Park. The new plan also envisions low-cost housing to help jumpstart reinvestment by Olde Hampton residents. This study and plan were undertaken by WPA and Ray Gindroz.
