Clarksville Neighborhood Celebrates Rich History
Long-time Clarksville resident Willis Littlefield can still point out where blacksmith Seymore Washington once practiced his trade. Photo courtesy of the Clarksville Community Development CorporationAudio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
When longtime Clarksville resident Pauline Brown died several years ago, she left behind a historical treasure. Her rare collection of photographs depicting the people and places of old Clarksville will be on display throughout the month of February in one of Austin’s most storied neighborhoods.
Clarksville is the 10-block neighborhood in Central Austin located roughly between Waterston Avenue on the north, West 10th Street on the south, West Lynn Street on the east and the Mopac on the west. Founded in 1871 by a freed slave named Charles Clark, it was the first freedman’s community west of the Mississippi. Today, Clarksville is officially designated as a National Register Historic District.
The neighborhood has changed a lot over the years. Ruthann Brown is the daughter of Pauline Brown, who donated the photographs. She grew up in Clarksville and remembers the old days.
“The whole neighborhood was predominantly black and Hispanic, and we have originally five black people in Clarksville now,” Brown says. “Our streets weren’t even paved until the early 80s, later 70s. The streets, when it would rain, would be just slush.”
Brown remembers a more unified community then, too.
“If I did wrong and I was on someone else’s street or someone else’s porch, I’d get a spanking. By the time I got home, I was already tried and convicted,” she said. “My mother had already found out what I had done, who I was with and what the punishment was going to be.”
Many of the original Clarksville homes are long gone, which is one reason why Pauline Brown helped to found the Clarksville Community Development Corporation nearly 40 years ago. The organization works to foster a sense of community among neighborhood residents. It raises funds to preserve historic structures and runs a housing program offering nine homes to 13 low-income families.
Mary Reed, president of the CCDC, speaks of one photo in the exhibit that depicts the historic Haskell House at 1703 Waterston Ave.
“It’s most representative of the kind of home that the early settlers built,” she said. “It’s a Cumberland-style board and batten house, unpainted.”
The home was built in 1865 by a freed slave. Over time, the property deteriorated.
“The city had no plans to rehabilitate the house,” Reed said. “It was falling apart and we felt like this was an important part of our history.”
The Clarksville Community Development Corporation stepped in. Today, the organization has a long-term lease with the city to manage the property. Just around the corner on 12th Street, not far from the Haskell House, long-time Clarksville resident Willis Littlefield can still point out where blacksmith Seymore Washington once practiced his trade.
“Now, they have a McMansion here next door to me. This is where he used to live. He used to shoe horses here. It used to be horse trailers all up and down this street,” Littlefield says.
He says it’s been hard to watch the neighborhood change so much, but some things stay the same. Just this week, his band played for a full house at the Sweet Home Missionary Baptist Church on 11th Street – the neighborhood church where just about everybody in Clarksville used to gather on Sundays.
Photos of the church and many other neighborhood gems will be on display inside the entrance of Jeffery’s Restaurant starting Friday afternoon. No purchase is necessary to view the pictures. Read more about the historic Clarksville neighborhood here.
