The historic 100-year old home of the James H. Bell famly at 20 Bernard Street got a two month repvrive yesterday at the meeting of the St. Augustine Hhisoric Architecture Review Board.
The Limelight THeater sought a demolition permit to tear down the small structure, long the home of the Bell family, at 20 Bernard Street.
In 1963-64, half the children desegrgating local schools were residents of Bernard Street, whose residents were threatened, fired and firebombed by KKK members and local segregaionists, empowerd by the St. Augustine Reord's then-owners, who supported the KKK, Sheriff Lawrence O. Davis and Police Chief Virgil Stuart and their violent tactics. The Record published the names and addresses of the children and their parents, spurring forseable retaliation, for which the Record never apologized.
An historic marker on the street commemoreates hte courage of those residents under fire.
The Limelight Theater's demolition permit sought to demolish the small old wooden house to use the land for "open space," admitting it was not in danger of falling down. Yesterday, Limelight said it wants the land for parking.
After more than an hour of testimony and discussion, HARB postponed a decision until February 20th, allowing time for the City's building inspector and an engineer for the Limelight Theater to inspect the structure, and for Limelight to attempt to find someone to move the house to another location.
Limelight's HARB hearing Thursday was only one month before the City of St. Augustine's exhibit, "Journey: 450 Years of African-American History" commences at the Visitor Information Center. The exhibit will be free for local residents and students, and is intended to promote healing.
Toward that end, Limelight needs to stop relying on dodgy evidence from construction contractor Mike Davis (not an engineer) and work to save the building at 20 Bernard Street.
So much of our history has been destroyed. No more. The whole world is watching.
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