The Peoria Historical Society is hosting a series of events to reignite memories of a neighborhood lost to time.
Southtown was a working class neighborhood of somewhere between 800 to 1,000 people on Peoria’s South Side. Local author and co-chair of the Place and Displacement committee Mae Catherine Godhigh describes the region as below High Street, along Main Street and Jefferson Avenue, stretching to areas near Western Avenue.
Godhigh said many of the families living in Southtown, a neighborhood of mixed demographics, settled in Peoria after two Great Migrations, one in the 1930s and another later in the 1950s.
“It was an underserved area, a very vulnerable area,” she said. “But yet, this community was really a self-reliant community. It had its own everything. Its barbers, its educators, its businesses. Its schools, its churches.”
Urban renewal programs sweeping the country in the late '60s and '70s had an impact on many neighborhoods, including Southtown. Godhigh said development promised the return of single-family homes amid attempted revitalization, but this outcome never materialized.
“These families were uprooted, they were separated, relationships were interrupted,” she said. “People went to various locations around the city of Peoria. Those relationships, some were maintained, some were lost.”
Godhigh and others partnered with the Peoria Historical Society are hosting a series of events to rekindle the memories and relationships of Southtown.
The series starts Friday night at the George Washington Carver Center at 710 W. 3rd Street from 5:30 to 8 p.m. The exhibit includes speakers on the history of the area, as well as Mayor Rita Ali and State of Illinois Chief Homelessness Officer Christine Haley.
The exhibit also includes hundreds of photographs from a collection maintained by the Peoria Public Library.
The Historical Society will also host panel sessions on May 10 and 14, also at the Carver Center.
“I think there’s going to be joy there. I think there’s going to be memories revived. I think, a sense of reconciliation, even,” said Godhigh, adding that some who lived in the neighborhood would be attending the events. “And so we’re just going to do everything we can to make everyone comfortable being part of this event, because this event is by the community, for the community.”
You can hear more about Place and Displacement and the historical society’s efforts to preserve memories of Southtown from executive director Elizabeth Klise on WCBU’s Out and About podcast with Dr. Mae Gilliland.
