Hillsboro Village Cultural Heritage and Community Center, 501 (c) (3)

Help! Reclaim, Protect and Resurrect Virginia's Freed-people’s Village

The Hillsboro Village Freed-people continue to resist being erased from memory. The opposition to the Freedmen’s freedom did not end in 1865, it is on-going. In addition to our socio-economic struggles, we face governmental actions that erased our enclaves’ physically from local memory as well as maps. Freedmen’s enclaves disappear by renaming them and physically absorbing their locations using post office zip code designations, re-zoning, urban planning, coerced migration and gentrification as real estate developers push to use rural land for urbanist communities. Such public and private socio-economic pressures historically cause the descendants of enslaved people to lose possession of historic lands, ancestral homes, and gathering places like rural churches, schools, barber shops, mom and pop grocery stores and community centers.

After release from Virginia’s enslavement system a small group of families struggled to establish an independent enclave in the foothills of Blue Ridge Mountain, Albemarle County, Virginia. Our Albemarle County Enclave was commonly known as Hillsboro Village. We are the Descendants of those struggling Hillsboro Village families released from Virginia’s enslavement in 1865.

The Hillsboro Village Enclave’s family businesses and the mom and pop grocery store are gone. We still have many of our original ancestral lands and ancestral homes, but the land and homes that are now gentrified are well beyond our economic reach. We are successfully watching over our Spiritual Center -- the Piedmont Baptist Church and the Cemetery. We are determined to Resurrect our Enclave’s Social Center—the Hillsboro Community Center. We are determined to Reclaim our Historical Existence and Memory as Hillsboro Village.

In 1888 around ten (10) families recently released from enslavement pulled together manpower, material and money to build the only Negro School in our foothills which became known as the Hillsboro Negro School. The Rosenwald/Booker T. Washington Negro School projects didn’t begin in Virginia until 1917. By 1900 the Hillsboro Negro School was educating twenty-two (22) of the area’s children. All of the children were Direct Descendants of families recently released from enslavement. Some children lived in Hillsboro Village but some lived in other Freedmen’s enclaves located within a twenty (20) radius of the school. The Hillsboro Negro School’s living alumni recall their used books, and their caring-supportive-teachers saying, the knowledge in these used books is the same as when they were new - study!

The Hillsboro Negro School served as a Destination Place and a Safe Space for freed individuals living in other Freedmen’s Enclaves. It was the Social Center established for community education, picnics, parties and other social amenities for children and families. The descendants of enslaved people always struggled to find Identifiable Safe Spaces to travel to and from our family-home to the home-of-relatives or friends, to Churches, Schools, Community Centers, Barber shops, Mom and Pop restaurants, Rooming houses, etc.

In 1952 The Hillsboro Negro School was unilaterally decommissioned by the County School Board. The small group of the enclave’s descendants reclaimed the Site as its Official Trustees. The Trustees Re-purposed the Site and School Facility. The site became known as the Hillsboro Community Center. Our 1888 facility did not have lights, running water or an inside bath room. The inside of our buildings had to serve practical and functional purposes. Like our Freedmen ancestors, we lacked financial resources so our buildings had to serve functional purposes and provide cultural and utilitarian value. So we struggled, but between 1952 and 1985 we collectively pulled together manpower, material and out-of-pocket-money to update the facility by adding a new section, a heating system, lights, running water, a kitchen, a bathroom and a septic system. These improvements allowed our rural Social Gathering Space to provide safe day and night-time amenities including community-meetings, wedding-receptions, family-reunions, baseball rallies, turkey-shoots, horse-shoe competitions, barbeques, picnics and other community enclave activities.

The historical society, state and federal grants are designed to support efforts to display post-civil war buildings as originally built. The idea is to display the structure as though the building was frozen in time. In 2010 we applied for state or federal historical site grants. We discovered that state and federal historical agency grants required that our 1888 building must meet the above pre-conditions: The Physical Structure must be unchanged, externally and internally. We could not get a grant, historical markers or plaque. We had updated our 1888 building using modern materials and installing utilities like heat, lights and water.

Our Hillsboro Village identity is being erased from history and local memory as the zip code area designations evolve. After the 1964 African American civil rights legislation many of Hillsboro’s child-descendants were migrated to consolidated schools. Many of the enclave’s young adults migrated out-of-state to find jobs to improve their individual educational and socio-economic situations. Like other rural Negro Enclaves, the migrations of our young adults cause the Hillsboro Village and the Hillsboro Community Center’s financial support to seriously suffer. The physical maintenance of the Hillsboro Community Center also suffered.

In addition, by 1968 our enclave’s local identity was absorbed by the postal district as part of Yancey Mills’ zip code designation. By 2024 our Hillsboro Village Enclave’s existence was further erased from local memory because the name Yancey Mills was fully incorporated within the postal district known as Crozet, Virginia. Today our Hillsboro Village Freedmen’s Enclave existence and location is not remembered or known by most of the residents of Crozet who arrived in the area after 2004.

Our Freedmen Enclave’ physical existence will be permanently erased from Crozet, Virginia’s memory. Your support is needed to Preserve Existence of the Piedmont Baptist Church, Reclaim Hillsboro Village’s Historical Presence, and Resurrect the Hillsboro Community Center which will serve as our Hillsboro Village Cultural Heritage Center. Your support will preserve our opportunity to continue sharing our cultural history within the fast growing Crozet Community. Serving as a Cultural-Heritage Tourism Destination will keep our enclave financially viable and keep us from being erased from the new Crozet’s Historical Memory.

Help us complete our survival plan before our Lived-Memories disappear. We plan to collect and share the stories of Hillsboro Village’s rich historical accomplishments and struggles. Most of us with Direct Freedmen Enclave Knowledge and Lived-experiences with our recently released enslaved ancestors are now 60+, 70+, 80+ and 90+ years of age living with fixed incomes. We need your immediate tax-deductible support to Resurrect our Historic Destination Place as a Self-Sustaining Cultural Tourism Destination Site.

The County officials are willing to refrain from taking adverse actions provided we have a recovery plan and follow through. We are contacting you and the family members of the Descendants of Hillsboro Village’s Freedmen Enclave who migrated seeking employment opportunities. We hope to gain the financial support needed for our survival. No donation is too small or too large. Donations will be acknowledged by our authorized 501 (c) (3).

In collaboration with the younger generation who live in the diaspora we plan to Re-Develop Our Heritage Site and build a Multifunctional Facility. Funds from our Cultural Heritage Tourism programs, On-site cultural experiences, history presentations and exhibits will support our future on-going operations, facility maintenance.

Our cultural and historic programs will tell the individual and collective stories of our original Freedmen Hillsboro Village Settlers. Our News Letter will allow all interest individuals and organizations to connect with us. Our Heritage Center’s open door policy will welcome visiting Hillsboro Village Diaspora descendants, as well as, provide on-site cultural experiences for students, heritage tourism activities, educators, community residents, friends and supporters.

The only organization authorized to speak or act on behalf is the Hillsboro Community Center Trustees is The Hillsboro Village Cultural Heritage and Community Center, 501 (c) (3), dba Hillsboro Village Diaspora. Our mission is dedicated to reclaiming, protecting and preserving the rich history of our Freedmen’s Enclave for the benefit of current and future generations of Hillsboro Village Freedmen living throughout the United States.

Immediate objective: Raise Fifty-thousand ($50,000.00) USD to use for the demolition of the current uninhabitable Hillsboro Community Center Remnant and preparing the Site for new construction, place a small interim structure on-site so that we can hold business meetings and other related activities until the multifunctional cultural center is constructed.

Longer-term objective: Raise Forty (40) per cent (that is $220,000 USD) of the total funds needed for the architect, blue prints and new construction before December 15, 2024.

We estimate the new multifunctional building we will cost more than Five-hundred and Fifty-thousand ($550,000.00) USD. We own the two-thirds acre tax-exempt site with an assessed value of Fifty-Five thousand-Six-hundred ($55,600.00) USD.

Hillsboro Community Center Trustees thanks you in advance for your prayers and support.