The West End Community Council: Building Interracial Community in Louisville’s West End

1[ he West End Community Council Building Interracial Community in Louisville' s West End Tracy E. K' Meyer nthe summerof1963Anne Bradenwatchedwithconcernasblock busting and white flight slowly ch·anged the racial character ofher neighborhood in the west end of Louisville from white to black. Her fear was not that she would be left in · a bl·ack neighborhood,but that an opportunity to create a truly integrated community would be lost. To stem the tide she contacted her friend Gladys Carter,the African American director of the Phyllis Wheatley YWCA, and together they hosted a meeting of people interested in keeping the area racially mixed. ' Ihe meetine led to the fi, unding of the West End Community Council,an interracial organization dedicated to promoting " true community living by bringing together residents of the west end of Louisville to study [ the] mutual problems and challenges of this area." 1 At first WECC sought to maintain an integrated neighborhood by welcoming black newcomers and discc, uraging white flight. Over E.21 1 Empowmit Zme Jefferson County, Kentucky, neighborhoods. KENTUCKY POPULATION RESEARCH, URBAN STUDIES INSTITUTE. UNIVERSITY OF LOUISVILLE Oil 10 VALLEY Il I STORY F1 Neighborhood Area 1990 Census Tract German' own Dow, 1cwn Phoentx Hill idlo, isv. Sm.. tow,1 helby Park Un.. tty Cl¢. saw City of Louisville Shaw... 4. C...'. 1. Park.. d t Algonquln Paik H] 1 ParkOuvalle 1 11 F" Cnek Floyd'. Highviaw Fal... Slat* 4 0 81* Is 16 TRACY E. K' MEYER the next eight years, however, the members sparked a citywide movement for open housing,coordinated the west end' s War on Poverty, sponsored community arts festivals, promoted black consciousness and pride,defended black militants accused of conspiracy,fought state repression of activists of all kinds, and organized residents to confront inequalities in the schools, politics,and jobs. The story of the West End Commtinin' Council contributes to our underst·anding of the civil rights and other social movements of the 1960s both locally and nationally. During its eightyear life, tlie organization filled a void iii the Louisville freedoni struggle. ' Ilic local Congress of Racial Equality had died by 1964 and in the post sitin period the NAACP was in a lull. In their place, WECC represented the grassroots African American community and gave white liberals a welcoming place to work against racism. WECC helped to lead not only the open housing movement but the fight against poverty and push for equalization of the schools. A detailed account of this indigenous organization makes possible a fuller understanding of the civilrights era in Louisville. As important, an examin·ation of WECC's philosophy and · actions sheds light on the relationships between the social movements of the 1960s. Popular understanding,and until recently historiWest End neighborhoods,Louisville,Kentucky. cal consensus,have held that the integrationist civil rights m() vement,Lyndon Johnson' s War on Poverty,and the black power movement were distinct and even at times antagonistic phenomena. Scholars have recently begun to draw the connections between these movements, however,showing the linkages between the civil rights and black power movements, and the sharing of personnel, resources, · and ideology between both and the War on Poverty. 2 WECC, an interracial group that saw fighting poverty and creating brotherhood as two sides of the same coin,and the promotion of black pride and selfsufficiency as the path toward a truly integrated society,demonstrates the nexus of these movements on the community level. Rather th·an regarding these movements and issues as separate, the founders and members of WECC saw them as different paths toward their ultimate goal: Ihe creation in the west end of an interracial community where people of different races and classes could work and live and solve thek problems together. When WECC was founded in the summer of 1963, Louisville activists were celebrating the city's recent passage of the first urban open accommodations ordinance in the South. By tliat time the community had a FALL 2007 PORTLAND 1·. 4 Rl' ISELL PH CHICKASA, : P. U1 , lili African American high school iii 1 1 1 11 1 1* 413 1 1 and college students and devel- i i i 1 118, 44/ 01 , , % 1 . oping a...