History

Hyattsville examines racist history

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Hyattsville’s institutional role in racist policymaking is being brought into sharper focus. 

Last week, City officials received a report on the city’s history of Jim Crow-era segregationist policymaking and land-dealing. They also began debating a resolution that would lay out a process to explore renaming Magruder Park. The sponsors of the measure say the park’s namesake, William Pinkney Magruder, was a white supremacist, noting he donated the parkland to the city with conditions that only white residents be allowed to use it. 

Hyattsville’s history of white supremacy was detailed before City Council last week by Hyattsville Community Development Corp. Executive Director Stuart Eisenberg. It was part of a presentation reviewing his work on the Mapping Racism project, which seeks to document and map properties subject to racially-restrictive covenants in Hyattsville.

History

Required Reading: Property values rise in Prince George’s; Murders drop; New laws

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Required Reading is a simple, daily roundup of news coverage relevant to Prince George’s County and its Route 1 communities. In our Jan. 2, 2018, edition: Murders fall, property values rise in Prince George’s County, and a very old building lives along Route 1. All this and more:

Tax assessments rise dramatically in Prince George’s County – The Baltimore Sun

Murders drop dramatically in Prince George’s County – WTOP

Inside one of the oldest structures along Route 1 – Hyattsville Wire

Maryland takes steps to address climate change – Capital News Service

Legalizing marijuana, banning ‘ghost guns’ on to-do list for Md. lawmakers – WTOP

New laws take effect – WTOP

Homepage Featured

Should Magruder Park change names to shed racist past?

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Some Hyattsville residents and elected officials want to rename Magruder Park, saying its namesake was a supporter of segregation and a Confederate sympathizer. 
The move comes amid a national debate about the appropriateness of monuments to the Confederacy, as well as an city initiative to create a long-term plan for the park, dubbed the Magruder Park “re-imagining.”
The name-change proposal vaulted into the city’s discourse earlier this week after Jim Groves, a prominent civic activist and occasional candidate for Hyattsville City Council, suggested it on a Hyattsville email listserv. Groves, in a Sept. 19, 2018 message to the listserv proposed changing the name. His rationale was that Magruder Park’s namesake, William Pinkney Magruder, donated the land to the park under terms that prohibited it from being used by anyone other than whites. Renaming the park has the support of a number of Hyattsville City Council members.