Justice
How a South Carolina Park Plans to Confront Its Racist History
Not only will Unity Park in Greenville, South Carolina, unite two formerly segregated parks; confronting and educating visitors about its history, including a segregated baseball stadium, is part of the design.
Around 1939, at a time when black people were lynched for much less, Rev. E.B. Holloway and his neighbors went to a city council meeting in Greenville, South Carolina.
The city had recruited a minor league baseball team and decided to take about half of the land from Mayberry Park—a Southernside park created for black children, who were not welcome at other Greenville parks—in order to build the Meadowbrook baseball stadium. So Holloway approached the city council to ask for a new park for blacks, and to protest the taking of the land.