Family sets up center

The center's goal is to reach out to black youths.
By JOHN W. GOODWIN JR.
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- A city family is hoping that the combination of a once-abandoned building, a lot of hard work and advanced knowledge of black history will add up to an enlightened future for area black youths.
Elizabeth Hudson was born and reared in Youngstown but left the area several years ago. Her husband, Samuel, had never lived in the area. The Hudsons decided to move to the Youngstown area three years ago with, as they have deemed it, a mission from God.
The couple bought the building and land on the city's East Side at 2943 McGuffey Road -- a former car sales lot in need of repair. With help from their daughter, they spent the last year repairing the building, collecting memorabilia and filling the building with facts about black history.
The result of the family's hard work is The Unity Building, a cultural center where Samuel and Elizabeth Hudson say the community can come for fellowship and learn and discuss black history.
The focus, they said, will be reaching area black youths.
What's planned today
There will be a grand opening today with games, food, and a tour of the building at 1, 3 and 5 p.m.
"Basically, this place is to bring unity to the community. That is what we are all about. This is something that God has placed in our hearts," Elizabeth Hudson said.
The building is filled with material showing the black experience in America.
There are also artifacts from Africa.
Hanging closest to the building's entrance are advertisements, but not the kind found in any newspaper today.
Some advertise slaves for sale, while others post rewards for blacks being sought while trying to escape bondage.
Other memorabilia include a sign reading "Colored Waiting Area."
There also is a "wall of shame" where photos hang of lynching and other acts of violence toward blacks.
Samuel Hudson said each picture has a story, and cards telling those stories will be printed and placed beside each photo.
There also is an old copy of the Emancipation Proclamation that freed slaves in 1863.
Not all the information available in the cultural center is tragic and painful, however. There is African art, art centered on American blacks, black dolls, and statues of animals found in Africa.
There is a large traffic stoplight to the rear of the center's main room to remind visitors of the achievements of black inventors.
A black man is credited with inventing the stoplight.
Also available
The Hudsons also have assembled a collection of books, movies and documentaries about blacks in America.
They said the movies and books can be used as learning tools for black youths and to facilitate discussion for everyone.
"What we would like to do is show at least one movie a week so people can see the things that African-American people have done, see the people who invented things and even the atrocities," Samuel Hudson said.
The Hudsons said there is no fee charged to those who come to the Unity Building. Donations are accepted.
Samuel Hudson said family members have used their entire savings to restore the building with little help from outside sources.
The remodeled area in the building being used for the cultural center is one medium-size room, but Elizabeth Hudson said the family does not plan to stop there.
She said, depending on the center's success, the family will soon get started restoring another area of the building three times the size of the space being used.
The center will be open from noon to 7 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.
jgoodwin@vindy.com