New Directions

Boston has no Negro-owned bank, hospital, insurance company, school, or any substantial businesses.

Boston Negroes have not exerted themselves to develop Negro-based businesses out of a belief that the result would be self-imposed segregation. In order, to achieve “integration” and avoid “segregation” Negroes have excluded themselves from those activities which are the avenues to equality.

Business is one of the most important institutions in American society. The corporation controls substantially all the nation’s wealth. It influences or directs the affairs of other powerful institutions such as the church, political parties, schools, and charitable foundations. Every minority group except the Negro has made a concerted effort for success in business.

Years ago Boston Negroes decided against ethnic-based business and focused their energies on changing the attitudes of whites. Through persuasion, legislation, or litigation, their objective was to induce whites to accept them.

Negroes thought they must conform to the mores of white society to be accepted. Everything ethnic was rejected. The only institutions to survive this cultural purge were the churches and the lodges, and even these were much changed.

Negroes firmly believed that they would be fully accepted by whites. And in this integrated utopia, all institutions would be used by black and white alike. Negro institutions, therefore, would be developed only to fill specific needs in the interim period.

After so many years even the most conservative Boston Negro has begun to wonder whether his dream will come true. The younger generation has become acutely aware that the race problem has two aspects — not only must whites change their attitudes toward Negroes, but Negroes must change their attitude towards themselves.

An era of self-awareness has set into the ghetto.

Blacks have become more conscious about the physical and cultural differences which distinguish them from whites. Now there is a great desire among Negroes to come together and function as a group.

The desire of Negroes for change exists, but the necessary institutions do not. The hapless policy of our past has left us now with no tools, but only a will for change.

Roxbury will have to play a more active role in the education of its children. The community will have to operate preprimary schools to give its youth a head start in education. And after-school classes must be run to give our children a keen awareness of our culture. As things are now, Negroes are the only minority group which leaves the education of its children completely in the hands of others.

Roxbury must establish its own educational and vocational guidance center. Much of our progress will depend upon academic achievement. With the many educational and vocational possibilities it would be hazardous to leave decisions on this to change.

Roxbury needs to control its own communications media. Clearly Negroes are a special interest group in Boston and in the United States, and as such they need an organ to assert their interests. Better communication is also needed so that we can talk to one another and can grow together as a group.

Roxbury Negroes need to build businesses. Without a financial base all other institutions will wither for lack of funds. Only through successful business activity can the wealth necessary to operate the non-profit institutions be generated. Only through vigorous participation in the economic life of America will Negroes be able to improve the status of the whole group.

Roxbury has not been idle. In the past year and a half, there has been an upsurge of activity to develop the community.

The New School for Children, Roxbury’s first community school, has begun. The Roxbury School Board, a group of interested people from the community, has been established to direct educational development.

Operation EXODUS has been set up by Roxbury parents to bus children from overcrowded schools in the community.

Plans for the establishment of Roxbury’s first Negro bank are in the final stages. The Unity Bank and Trust Company is expected to open its doors for business no later than March, 1967.

The New England Grass Roots Organization (N.E.G.R.O.) has been established to develop new techniques for communication in Roxbury.

Opportunities Industrialization Center (O.I.C.) has begun operations to retrain community workers.

The BAY STATE BANNER, a Negro-owned and operated weekly newspaper, has been in publication for over a year.

The people of Roxbury are willing to work to develop their community. Friends from the suburbs are eager to help. It is likely that Boston will be the first major city to resolve the problems of its ghetto.