First of all, my Mom insists that the reason we left Detroit was because of the riots 4 year prior. My Dad's transfer out of town came through and we jumped on it. We got out before black people started moving in the neighborhood. Several neighbors did approach my parents, concerned that we would sell the house to a black family. My Dad sold the house to his company, and our next door neighbors, the Bolognas, ended up buying it. My uncle, who not too long afterwards rented the house for a short time, told me the Bologna's bought it and the house on the other side of thier house in the hopes of keeping black people out of them. He also said the David's were "marked" because they were the first on the block to sell thier house to a black family.
Another concern for moving was St. David's elementary school. The Diocese tried to close the school about the time we moved out, but a group of parents got together and were able to save it. I suspect the reason was declining enrollment. My uncle tells me that for a long time, black families lived on the other side of Conner, and Conner was the dividing line. But then black families started moving in on our side of Conner. And these black families were for the most part not Catholic. So the school enrollment was probably declining because of the declining proportion of catholics in the neighborhood.
The school probably played a huge part in keeping the neighborhood together. In my grandparent's block on Kilbourne, right behind the church, almost everybody on the block was a parishoner. On our block, 3 short blocks and 1-1/2 long blocks away, the percentage was probably less. But still a large proporation of people on our block were St. David's parishoners. Once the school goes, there isn't alot left to hold the neighborhood together.
One hypothesis my uncle put forth is that if each house on the block has a dozen kids, when those kids grow up there aren't enough houses in the neighborhood for them to raise thier families in, so they have to move out of the neighborhood. But if that were the reason for the white flight, it seems there would still be demand for houses among white families in the neighborhood, and the black families wouldn't have the opportunity to move in?
Another uncle lived not too far away on Corbett Street. He lived there from about 1967-1971 I think. He left for Sterling Heights about the same time we moved out. Again, there weren't black families living in his neighborhood at the time he moved out. But there was enough trouble with the white "hillbillies" who moved intot he neighborhood. Two doors down, at 11:30 PM one night, a woman shot an ex boyfriend who was trying to win her heart back and was trying to enter her bedroom via a ladder outside. There was another hillbilly family that was causing trouble too. So he figured he could get out so he did.
I wonder about what I call the "white crime" hypothesis. That is, lower class whites moved into the neighborhood, crimes started going up, causing higher-class whites to move out. That created vacancies for black families to move into the neighborhood then. Some day, I am going to find some data to test this hypothesis.
The "white crime" hypothesis might have some merit. For instance, I was told there were a huge number of auto thefts in the old neighborhood about the time my uncles were coming of age.
But everybody, to a person, agrees the old neighborhood at one time was an exceptionally great place to live and raise a family.
So then I asked a stupid question at the bachelor party: "How come the conservative catholics all voted for Bush?" That effectively stopped all talk of the old neighborhood for the night!
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