By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
A newly created historical and cultural society will be devoted to the Witherspoon-Jackson community, led by local historian and longtime resident of the neighborhood, Shirley Satterfield.
“We want to kind of let you know that it’s important to understand history, it’s important to understand and have a sense of history,” said former Princeton resident John Bailey, a co-founder of the Witherspoon-Jackson Historical and Cultural Society with Ms. Satterfield, on Tuesday. “(B)ecause if you don’t know where you’ve been, you won’t know where you’re going.”
Mr. Bailey, who spent part of his childhood living in that neighborhood, announced the creation of the organization at a community event inside the 19th-century-Witherspoon Street Presbyterian Church that was started by Princeton’s black community.
The purpose of the society will be like any similar group, namely to preserve and document the history of black life in Princeton. The organization will look to have a space in town to operate out of and have programs and tours of the neighborhood that spans Paul Robeson Place to Birch Avenue, with John and Witherspoon streets as its perimeters.
Ms. Satterfield, later in a talk about the history of Princeton’s black community and one of its notable members, Mr. Robeson, recalled how Princeton’s black residents “for generations contributed (to) and sustained this historic town.”
“The African-American community has been a vital part in Princeton since the early 18th century,” she said. “Many residents were slaves who worked on large farms and in homes as agriculture and domestic servants.”
In later years, blacks from the South came to Princeton looking for work she said.
“The increasing wealth in the community together with the university’s growth created a high demand for labor and service positions that were generously offered to the colored residents,” she said. “Many were families who moved to Princeton from southern states who had settled in many areas in Princeton. These families were eventually relegated to the area that is now known as the Witherspoon-Jackson community.”
Earlier in the program, Mr. Bailey recalled a conversation he and Ms. Satterfield had last year in which she told him of wanting to preserve the history of Witherspoon-Jackson. Subsequently, others have gotten involved in helping with the newly formed organization.
“And this will be a group of folks who will consistently work on trying to maintain and preserve our history in this community,” Mr. Bailey said.
The creation of the historical and cultural society comes the same year that the town made Witherspoon-Jackson a historic district, the 20th in Princeton. Mayor Liz Lempert, appearing at the church event, said it had been “incredibly moving” to have been part of that process.
She recalled the “outpouring” from people who live in Witherspoon-Jackson and also those who moved away but “carry the neighborhood with them wherever they go.”
