Macon Magazine

DECEMBER/JANUARY 2023 | maconmagazine.com 97 CHAMPIONING THE CAUSE OF HERITAGE THE LEGACY OF TWO MEN FROM PLEASANT HILL ECHOES IN THE BUILDINGS THAT BEAR THEIR NAMES, WHICH CONTEMPORARY ACTIVISTS IN MACON HOPE TO SAVE. BY GEORGE FADIL MUHAMMAD PHOTOGRAPHY BY MATT ODOM AND OBY BROWN D espite over 200 years of poverty, tragic violence, education and health adversities, and the ravages and exploitations of racism, Black citizens of Macon yet possess an ancestral heritage of astounding natural excellence to draw from. Only a few historic buildings stand in Fort Hill, Unionville, Downtown Macon, and Pleasant Hill, reminders of extraordinary seasons of brilliant Black achievers. The demand now resounds for a new Black success, a new Macon success, for our community to awaken and champion Black Macon's value, power, and proper priority. An important step toward resurrecting our traditions of greatness is to preserve and establish the purposeful reengagement of such meaningful structures of triumph to serve as inspiration for present and future generations. Two of the few remaining historical places of treasured heritage in southeast Pleasant Hill, just around the corner from one another, pay homage to community service luminaries Dr. Eustace Edward Green and Dr. Bobby Jones: The Green House and The Bobby Jones Performing Arts Center. Both leaders exemplified the invaluable traits of skill, knowledge, and generosity in their personal outreach to cultivate communities. The historic structures named for these men have become publicly recognized in recent years, as evidenced by their designation as preservation sites by the Historic Macon Foundation's Fading Five program. Since the launch of Macon's Fading Five in 2015, Historic Macon has put 18 properties on the list. By creating a strategic preservation plan for each of the listed properties, 12 of them have been saved and protected, while just one Fading Five property has been lost. The Green House was recognized in April in the Grand Opera House's interactive history play about the past, present, and future of Pleasant Hill titled Healing a Haunted House, and the performing arts center building was highlighted for many years on Juneteenth Black History Tours hosted by the Bobby Jones Center. Dr. E.E. Green was an outstanding academic born enslaved in 1845 in Wilmington, North Carolina, freed at age 20 after the Union Army's arrival there at the end of the Civil War. As someone whose home city was the site of one of the worst race riots in US history in 1898 and a subsequent mass exodus of Black people, Green was acutely aware of the urgent conditions of his times and his people. He was educated at the historically Black college and university (HBCU) Lincoln University, where he earned his undergraduate and master's degrees. He then completed certification as a medical doctor at age 41 from Howard University Medical School. After obtaining his M.D., he moved to Macon. The Green House is a two-story structure at the corner of Madison Street and Green Street Lane built by Green in 1890. It was here that he raised his family and, after a few years of operating the Central City Drug Store on Cotton Avenue, moved his pharmacy into the home. Green's influence and property ownership led to the naming of the street next to his house as "Green's Lane," which can still be seen on the street corner. As one of the Pleasant Hill neighborhood's early pillars, he was involved in civic affairs, a proponent of educational PICTURED LEFT TO RIGHT: ETHIEL GARLINGTON WITH DAKOTA MOORE, FOURTH- GENERATION PLEASANT HILL RESIDENT

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