Douglas Williams | Ann Arbor District Library

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Media

There Went The Neighborhood - Audio Interview: Fred Adams

Sat, 08/10/2024 - 2:12am

Fred Adams attended Jones School from kindergarten through ninth grade, from 1937 to 1947. During junior high he played in the Intramural Football League against teams from Tappan and Slauson. He also recalls several Black-owned businesses on Ann Street, where his father worked.

More interviews are available in the There Went The Neighborhood Interview Archive.

Media

There Went The Neighborhood - Studio Interview: Russell Calvert

Wed, 08/07/2024 - 2:01pm

Russell Calvert attended Jones School from kindergarten through sixth grade in the post-WWII era. He recalls the strong influence of Black business owners like his father, Burgess Calvert, and Charlie Baker. He tells the story of “The Old Neighborhood” before it became known as Kerrytown.

This interview was filmed during the making of the documentary film There Went The Neighborhood: The Closing of Jones School, produced by the Ann Arbor District Library and 7 Cylinders Studio. More interviews are available in the There Went The Neighborhood Interview Archive.

Accident Scene Of Parked Car Hit On N. Fourth Avenue, June 1947

Year:
1947

Published In:
Ann Arbor News, June 16, 1947
Caption:
THREE CHILDREN HURT IN PARKED CAR: Kenneth, 3, and Herbert, 5 - sons of Dunbar Center director Douglas Williams - and Jackie Taylor, 7, of 114 E. Kingsley St., suffered minor cuts and bruises when the above car, in which they were sitting, was knocked through the plate-glass window of Sadie's Beauty Shop by another machine that went out of control in the 200 block of N. Fourth Ave. this morning. The other automobile, being driven the wrong way down the one-way street by Jack A. Predovich, 26, a disabled war veteran, hit two other vehicles and burst into flames after knocking down a gasoline pump at the Abbott Gasoline station, N. Fourth and Ann. The driver was only slightly injured.

Read more about Accident Scene Of Parked Car Hit On N. Fourth Avenue, June 1947
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Dunbar Center

The Dunbar Center--also known at various times at the Dunbar Civic Center and the Dunbar Community Center--was a social and social services organization for Ann Arbor's Black community in the mid-twentieth century. It was the direct precursor to the Ann Arbor Community Center. Along with the Bethel AME Church and the Second Baptist Church, the Dunbar Center was a major hub of social life for the Black community during this period.

Founding

Police Turn Over Captured Escapee, Douglas Williams, To County Detective, March 24, 1947 Photographer: Eck Stanger

Police Turn Over Captured Escapee, Douglas Williams, To County Detective, March 24, 1947 image

Year:
1947

Published In:
Ann Arbor News, March 24, 1947
Caption:
Captured Fugitive Returned To Jail: Douglas Williams, nabbed Saturday afternoon by Ann Arbor Patrolman, Howard R. Remnant (left) five and half hours after the Ypsilanti Negro made a spectacular break for freedom from the courthouse where he was on trial, is turned over to Lt. Erwin Klager, of the Washtenaw sheriff's detective bureau, from whom he had escaped. Remnant found Williams hiding in the basement of a N. Fourth Ave upholstery shop after the courthouse area had been surrounded and combed in one of the most intensive manhunts ever staged in Ann Arbor. Williams' trial as a fourth offender under the Habitual Criminal Act was scheduled for resumption today. He faces a life sentence if convicted.