SARASOTA – The baseball legend lives on here, even though Buck O’Neil has been dead for over a decade.  

Folks around here will be reminded of that this weekend, as the Sarasota neighborhood where he grew up will carry his image in an exhibition on loan from the Negro League Baseball Museum in Kansas City.  

The “Buck O’Neil: Right on Time” exhibition opens Saturday at the Robert L. Taylor Community Complex.

The exhibit will honor the late O’Neil, who grew up in Sarasota before becoming a standout player and manager in the Negro Leagues and, late in his life, a beloved baseball icon.  

The inaugural exhibition of the Sarasota African American Cultural Coalition is in partnership with the City of Sarasota, the Baltimore Orioles, Newtown Alive and the Community Foundation of Sarasota County.  

More:Buck O’Neil’s legacy: Baseball and beyond

With the exception of Sundays, the exhibit can be viewed daily from 10 a.m.-5 p.m. until March 20.  

Read the Article Here.

In April 2018 Vickie Oldham and 12th Judicial Circuit Court Judge Charles Williams wrote a column in the Herald-Tribune bearing the headline “Newtown needs an art center and museum.”

In their opening paragraph Oldham and Williams stated that “cultural arts centers, museums and libraries situated in the heart of African American neighborhoods add texture, vibrancy and richness to a community.”

And in concluding their piece, the duo declared that it was now “time to take another giant, groundbreaking leap forward to construct a center and museum in the community with library capabilities.”

Those words rang true three years ago. And they ring true today, too: Now

is the time to make a Sarasota African American Art Center and History Museum a reality. The good news is that much progress has made since that 2018 column was published.

The Sarasota African American Cultural Coalition has been formed with funding from the city of Sarasota. The mission of the coalition is to preserve, celebrate and share the cultural, artistic and historical heritage of African Americans in Sarasota and beyond – with a goal of opening a physical center for African American culture and history in Newtown.

By working in diligent fashion the coalition has:

• Formally become a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.

• Recruited outstanding board members.

• Held several community stakeholders meetings to collect diverse

perspectives.

• Conducted research regarding other museums.

• Taken meaningful steps toward bringing a Sarasota museum to life.

So where are we now with a Sarasota African American Art Center and History Museum? After a lot of hard work with the city’s administration and staff, a suitable location for the art center and history museum – Orange Avenue and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Way – has been chosen. As part of this plan, the historic Leonard Reid House will be moved to the site to serve as a temporary museum home until the permanent facility is built.

During the city commissioners’ July 6 meeting, Sarasota African American Cultural Coalition CEO Vickie Oldham will make a presentation and unveil renderings of a permanent facility. We will also ask the commissioners to direct city staff to develop an agreement allowing the coalition to hold 1.3 acres of the Orange Avenue property while a five-year fundraising effort takes place to build the permanent facility next to the relocated Leonard Reid House.

This effort has drawn a diverse group of community partners – and the city commissioners can play an important role in strengthening the futures of both Newtown and the arts overall in Sarasota.

This is also an important moment for the Sarasota African American Cultural Coalition. We appreciate our partnerships with our city and community, and we look forward to seeing these ties grow even stronger as we work together to develop a great asset for Sarasota –. the Sarasota African American Art Center and History Museum.

For details on the Sarasota African American Cultural Coalition, visit www.thesaacc.com.

Washington Hill is a Sarasota obstetrician- gynecologist and board chair of the Sarasota African American Cultural Coalition. Email: [email protected]

SARASOTA – The Leonard Reid family played a critical role in the establishment of Sarasota’s earliest African American community. Now their home is one step closer to playing a critical role in preserving that community’s rich history and future. 

In the summer, the city of Sarasota, an area developer, Newtown Alive and the Sarasota African American Cultural Coalition reached an agreement to move the historic Reid house to the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. corridor in Newtown to serve as the starter home of Sarasota’s first center honoring the legacy and impact of its Black community. 

This week city commissioners agreed to spend up to $116,000 from local business taxes that were previously earmarked for a grant to help business owners weather the coronavirus. The funding will be used to help cover the costs to prepare the parcels on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Way and Orange Avenue. 

GUEST EDITORIAL: The history of Black America by James Stewart

As president of the Manasota branch of the Association for the Study of African American Life and History, I am responding to a recent letter (“Black History Month provides education,” Oct. 31) disputing the need for a lynching memorial in the local community.

While the writer correctly identifies the name of the organization and its founding date, there are several misconceptions and inaccuracies that need to be addressed. What is now celebrated as Black History Month was inaugurated in 1926 by Dr. Carter G. Woodson to highlight the history and accomplishments of African Americans. However, his intent was not to restrict the examination of this topic to February.

Local branches, including the 350-member Manasota branch, were organized to encourage preservation of local records and artifacts. In addition, Woodson championed the dissemination of knowledge through a variety of initiatives, including school curricula.

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The Leonard Reid home will be moved from the Rosemary District to city land in Newtown to become the beginnings of the Sarasota African American Cultural Center.

It’s not every day you bring together a governmental agency, a developer and two organizations focused on historic preservation and cultural celebration and walk away with a deal that’s satisfying to everyone.

But that’s exactly what happened last week when the city of Sarasota, developer John Hermansen, Newtown Alive and the Sarasota African American Cultural Coalition (SAACC) reached an agreement to move a historic house to the Dr. Martin Luther King Way corridor in Newtown to serve as the starter home of Sarasota’s first center honoring the legacy and impact of its Black community.

City commissioners, who voted unanimously for the purchase of nearly two acres at MLK and North Orange Avenue where the house will reside, were happy to envision a destination likely to provide an economic boost to the city’s predominantly African American neighborhood.

Hermansen, eager to develop the plot at Seventh Street and Cohen Way where the house now sits, was so happy to find a suitable site for the historic structure that he offered to bear the cost of moving it.

SAACC board members were happy to see their vision of a physical space in Newtown to exhibit, explore and celebrate Sarasota’s Black heritage, culture and arts coming to fruition much sooner than anticipated.

And Vickie Oldham — a Newtown native who returned from Atlanta in 2015 for a temporary respite, but stayed to become the one-woman force behind Newtown Alive’s documentation of local Black history — was ecstatic to witness what seemed like a serendipitous collision of that effort and the country’s current conversation about race.

“I thought there would always be a remnant of people interested in our history, but I never dreamed the country would be going through the transition and awakening it’s now experiencing,” said Oldham, who, with the city’s support of Newtown Alive, has gathered written and oral histories from Newtown residents and created a walking trail of historic markers, trolley car tours, and a book and website over the past five years. “My heart bleeds for what had to occur for us to get to this point, but it’s as if this is the perfect moment and it was always meant to be.”

Several steps remain for the arrangement to be finalized. The city will not close on seven contracted parcels until Aug. 14; a lease agreement must be negotiated between SAACC and the city; and the historic preservation board must approve moving the former family home of Leonard Reid from the Rosemary District.

However, none of the parties envision obstacles and the project meshes nicely with a $50,000 grant the city recently received from the National Parks Service’s Underrepresented Communities Program to help establish a Newtown Conservation Historic District.

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