It’s well worth all Spotlight reader’s time to stroll the length of Charles Avenue aka Evangelist Street. Start at the historic markers at Douglas Road and learn about Macedonia Church and the Charlotte James Cemetery. Proceed to the marker at Plaza Street telling about the historic wood frame houses that used to be on the SW corner and look over to some still remaining on the SE Corner. Continue walking past St. James Church and Christ Episcopal until you get to the marker for the Mariah Brown house–still waiting to complete its renovation and grand opening as a Children’s Museum after 25 years since it was reconstructed on site. It’s right next to the historic Odd Fellows Hall–now also a community church. Finish up at the marker by the abandoned world-renowned Coconut Grove Playhouse built a century ago with the labor of Bahamian immigrants on land once owned by a Bahamian immigrant.
Then maybe ask yourself how any city proclaiming itself to be “World Class” can allow one of its oldest designated historic streets, supposedly protected by a Neighborhood Conservation District, to be assaulted by permitted “White Box” houses and used as a cut-thru street without a single traffic calming device. What a travesty, What a waste! Even more so when you think this same City renamed this entire section of itself as “Little Bahamas.”
Andy Parrish
Coconut Grove
