The Hall Community

The Hall community, earlier known as Peniel, then Walnut Hill, was established in 1916 when the Aluminum Company of America (ALCOA) built 137 two- and three-room homes for African American workers who had been recruited and hired to build the local plant and to work in the aluminum potrooms. In the days of segregation, the homes built for those workers were smaller than the homes built for white workers. The company hired John T. Arter to serve as the principal of the separate school for black youth, and he became an important community leader and advocate for the African American community., Captions (clockwise from top left) , . The Hall community and the South Plant in 1922. , . Some of the earliest African American potroom workers standing in front of an aluminum pig. This picture was used in a pamphlet throughout the Deep South to recruit African American workers. , . The Community Hall was located on the lot across Howe Street between Charles M. Hall School and St. Paul A.M.E. Church. It was built in 1918 to provide recreational and meeting facilities for the African American community. , . Two of the approximately 400 homes built by the Company for African American workers between 1917 and 1920. , . The African American community brass band is shown on the steps of Community Hall in 1919. L-R, front, Dan Townsend, Charles Hodson, Fred Davenport, Henry Pinstone, and Will Brown; second row, James Jones, Rex Cansler, Henry Jefferson, and Walter Patton.