Recreation and River Park

Recreation and River Park. River Farms to Urban Towers. , Washington's schools and playgrounds were legally segregated from 1862 until 1954. But that didn't stop kids of all backgrounds from playing together. "We didn't understand racial disharmony," said Southwester Gene Cherrico of his childhood on Sixth Street in the 1950s. "Everybody was equal. Everybody was poor." Yet playground monitors tried to keep the races apart. Through the trees ahead of you is the King-Greenleaf Playground, formerly the white-only Hoover Playground amid a largely black neighborhood. Randall Playground, some five blocks ahead, was operated for black children, and whites were regularly shooed away. , , For adults, though, social time was more segregated. When public housing first opened here, residents met in social and self-improvement groups such as the Syphax Homemakers Club. Long past the 1953 court-ordered end to segregation in public accommodations, the adults of Southwest found entertainment on their own sides of the Fourth Street dividing line. African Americans enjoyed Bruce Wahl's restaurant and summertime beer garden at Fourth and C streets. Whites gathered at waterfront watering holes such as Hall's Restaurant, at Seventh and K. Founded in 1864, Hall's had been a favorite of General U.S. Grant. , , To your right are the townhouses and highrises of River Park. Architect Charles M. Goodman worked with Reynolds Metals to feature aluminum in his unique design for urban residential architecture. When River Park was opened as a cooperative in 1963, its residents worked to ensure an integrated population. From the beginning, they have made decisions together governing the use and care of the River Park facilities.