Planning department calling on community for letters of support for historic grant for North Rome
The Rome-Floyd Planning Department is calling on members of the community to send in letters of support for a special grant that would go toward preserving the history of North Rome.
The National Park Service’s Underrepresented Community Grant Program works towards diversifying the nominations submitted to the National Register of Historic Places. URC grants are funded by the Historic Preservation Fund and are administered by the NPS.
Projects include surveys and inventories of historic properties associated with communities underrepresented, including historic
Black communities, in the National Register, as well as the development of nominations to the National Register for specific sites.
Senior Planner and Historic Preservation Director Brittany Griffin has been diving into the history of North Rome, which was once a major hub for Black and minority businesses in the city.
There are two places in North Rome which are included in the National Registry for Historic Places: Thankful Baptist Church, which was founded by freed slaves following the passing of the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, and Main High School, which was once the only high school for minorities before Brown v. the Board of Education was passed.
“We don’t know this history... so the goal is to use this grant to finish the oral histories and place it on the register,” Griffin said.
However, North Rome as a whole isn’t registered as a historic district. In fact, the only historic districts with ties to Black and minority history in Floyd County are outside of the city limits, specifically the Chubbtown area in Cave Spring and the Fairview School.
“National honor comes with national register. It’s the federal government recognizing that this place is especially important to local history,” Griffin said. “The national register of historic places has a diversity issue that they’ve realized. Preservationists have been telling them that for years that they have a diversity issue because they’ve been focusing on traditional preservation up until recently.”
She described traditional preservation as “white preservation,” meaning that certain plantations and other structures have been preserved, but the slave quarters are oftentimes overlooked.
“And we’re starting to realize now that the story of the slave quarters, which supported the plantation to be successful, is the more important story,” Griffin said.
Griffin has already sent in the application for the grant, requesting $30,000, which they plan to use to hire a historic preservation consultant to finish the oral histories of North Rome, get it on the National Registry of Historic Places and rebuild and identify the original layout of Five Points, which was once a major hub for Black businesses in Rome.
However, Griffin needs letters from the community supporting the grant, what North Rome means to them and how it ties them into the community and why obtaining the grant is important for North Rome.
Griffin has been working closely with Charles Love, a longtime advocate and supporter of North Rome, to procure the letters.
“North Rome was the center of minority business activity at its best... and why North Rome hasn’t received the recognition it should have is a good question,” Love said. “That urban renewal, which built the four lane highway, split the community so my response to what Brittany (Griffin) is doing is ‘It’s about time.’”
People can email letters of support to Griffin at bgriffin@romega.us or mail it to the Planning Department at 607 Broad Street, Rome, GA 30161. You can also drop it off at the office. The deadline for the application and letters is Aug. 10.
For more information, you can contact Griffin at 706-236-5025.