Voices of Milwaukee Bronzeville
As Sandra Jones reminds us, Milwaukee’s Bronzeville wasn’t called by that name in its heyday. The term for the historic heart of Milwaukee’s Black community was borrowed in recent years from Chicago’s African American district. But even when the area bordered by Highland and Walnut, Third and 12th streets had no name, it was “a city within a city with thriving businesses and a vibrant social structure.”
Voices of Milwaukee Bronzeville tells stories of “denial and confinement, of segregation, but is also a narrative of a community united in looking out for the well-being of all within.” In writing Voices, Jones, a retired UW-Milwaukee African studies professor, drew from the memories of longtime Milwaukeeans who lived in Bronzeville and recounts the human cost of the ill-conceived “urban renewal” that diminished the neighborhood.
Sandra Jones will discuss Voices of Milwaukee Bronzeville 6:30 p.m., Nov. 18 at Boswell Books.
