The release this month of the Netflix documentary “Descendant” is shining a light on the Africatown community, its origins and struggles with environmental injustices.

But it’s also spotlighting a future that community activists believe includes tourism.

Several near-term projects are viewed as a cornerstone of Africatown’s future and its elevated expectations as a tourist destination in Mobile. But two of those main projects – the Africatown Heritage House and Welcome Center – have been slowed in recent months due to contractual snafus or supply chain issues.

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Optimism, though, remains high that 2023 will bring tourists to a community founded after the Civil War by African slaves illegally brought into the United States aboard the ship Clotilda by a slave trader in 1860.

“I’m excited about the attention that the ‘Descendant’ film has brought to the community, and I am optimistic that a lot of good things will happen because of the attention the film has brought to the community,” said Jeremy Ellis, president of the Clotilda Descendants Association.

Key projects

The main projects and their updated timelines include:

• The $1.3 million Heritage House, which was supposed to be open mid-summer, is now on target for a spring 2023 opening. The Heritage House is a 5,000-square-foot modular building, but its construction has lagged and there is no confirmation on when it’s supposed to be 100 percent completed. The History Museum of Mobile has access to the building and is in the “very early stages” of establishing “Clotilda: The Exhibition,” according to county spokeswoman Sharee Broussard. Setting up the exhibit and establishing operations within the space is expected to take several months, she said. A memorial garden will also be part of the project’s landscaping, and its centerpiece will be a sculpture designed by renowned potter, Charles Smith, in collaboration with metal artist Frank Ledbetter, whose public art installations have received national attention.
• Bids are being reassessed on the design of an approximately $3.6 million Welcome Center that will be constructed off Bay Bridge Road and across from the Old Plateau Cemetery. A new search is underway for an architectural firm to lead the project, and the city – which is leading the Welcome Center project – hopes to have a firm under contract by mid-November. The project is expected to be completed in 2024.

• A former Scott Credit Union building is set to be demolished and a new building constructed on property that was sold to the city in 2021 for $50,000 by the descendants of Timothy Meaher. He was the wealthy steamship owner and slave trader who owned the Clotilda and orchestrated its illegal voyage. The new building will be called “Africatown Hall” and will include a food bank and offices for community organizations. The Mobile County Commission will consider bids for that project during a November meeting. An estimated cost for the project, including demolition, is $1 million.

Community revitalization

Mobile County Commissioner Merceria Ludgood, who has led most of the public-backed efforts within the community, said there are ongoing revitalization plans throughout the community that includes improvements to Africatown’s housing stock.

She said most of that work will be led by the Africatown Redevelopment Corporation, an organization that was formed in 2021 and has been meeting at the Robert L. Hope Community Center over the past year.

Marc Jackson, an ARC board member, said the group is planning to name its executive director soon. That person will then be in charge of overseeing a project that includes the construction of new houses and the rehabilitation of older housings within the community.

Jackson said the group has enough resources to oversee 25 projects.

“It’s going to be scattered throughout the community,” Jackson said.

Lantern walk

Other efforts include community events, such as the revival of an Africatown lantern walk that has not occurred within the community since 1952.

The new lantern walk will take place around 4:30 p.m. on November 19, beginning at the Mobile County Training School and extending along a route that includes several of the community’s churches, which are participating. It will conclude at the cemetery.

“It is so individuals will understand the connection of our community as one,” said Anderson Flen.

Flen is founder of the Africatown Heritage Preservation Foundation – an umbrella organization for the entire community when it comes to overseeing all aspects with the discovery of the Clotilda and the developments with telling Africatown’s story.

The lantern walk is not connected to the Clotilda story but is a part of the many rituals that have long existed in Africatown, Flen said.

“This will bring back that connection and it will be a healing of the community from the inside out,” he said.