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A Story of Hope. Hope Whitlock, an inspiration for A Place for Hope's call to service. "Hopie", (friends and family !!), was indeed the motive the founder of A Place for Hope, Donna Berry, intuitively felt, leading her to drive into a community of which she knew nothing. Never been there...not a clue as to why she was there at all...except maybe for the dreams. So, how did this Human Resources professional wind up in a place filled with both the savage 'survivalist' status quo of abject poverty in the mindset of all who go here, and ask the questions one asks about the universal meaning to anything in a place that almost fell off the map? With her own elderly mother in tow, Donna drove to a location that she instinctively knew was part of her 'inner vision' which repeatedly told her to seek this place out...and to help the folk living there. She found herself at Hope Whitlock's door, took a leap of faith and knocked. The conversation went something like..."...hello, I know you don't know me, but my name is Donna, and I dreamed of this place"...to which was replied "...that wasn't a dream, honey...God gave you a vision..." They have been good friends ever since.
Mrs.
Whitlock was raised the daughter of Chester, SC sharecroppers. She tells
us that she worked in the cotton fields most of her life. That memory,
she states, is not a happy one.
Mrs. Whitlock is
the mother of seven. She and her husband moved from the cotton fields of
Richburg, SC to Rock Hill in 1963. Her four-room home was built by hand
from discarded building materials and by whatever means necessary by her
late husband. Decades later, ripped screens, broken glass, rusted
discarded appliances, and desperate poverty was the landscape. The
children see and learn...and try to survive. The residents sleep in
shifts because of the limited space in the home. Hope's house is the
heart of the Blackmon Road Community, where folks in need stop for a
bite to eat, or a drink of water from the tainted well on Archer Drive,
or a moment's rest. The door of her home on Blackmon Road is always
open.
A Place for Hope's mission is one of helping people.
The Blackmon Road Community, 'just this side' of Rock
Hill, SC, is one of the poorest communities
in South Carolina. Through no fault of their own except,
perhaps, that they were born poor, many of the residents of the Blackmon Road
Community continue to live in third world
conditions. They live without indoor plumbing, bathrooms or showers,
without trash pick-up, without paved roads, and without street
lights – effectively, without the basic material necessities we have
come to expect in one of the wealthiest countries in the world.
For years the Blackmon Road community (some still refer to it from its
late 40's-50's moniker "Trash Pile Road") has been on the border between
the city of Rock Hill and York County, invisible and ignored...and less
than a mile away from the center of a growing and bountiful city,
teeming with resources. The year is 2011...nearly ten (10) years since
our mission had began, and yet...there are homes and dwellings that
remain in need of urgent, basic human services.
In terms of access
to water and sewer infrastructure, healthcare, and basic human services, the Blackmon Road Community
has been designated by the South Carolina Department of Health and
Environmental Control as being the "most severely underserved community
in the entire state".
We find this situation to be fraught with a
myriad of complex issues, too broad in scope and too many, to try
and address them all on this page. We are shamed in this, the land of opportunity and hope,
as we see our fellow Americans...our sisters and our brothers and their
children and grand-folk living in the searing pain and uncertainty that
the life of generational poverty brings with it.
There are infants, school-aged children and teens who live in the Blackmon Road Community,
and the dozens of children of extended families who, more often than not, spend
their days and nights in the care of the adult family members living in
the community.
These
children are part of a cycle of poverty that we have the
capacity to interrupt and change, by offering support and access to
basic social services. They need the kinds of structural
support, educational programming, and psychological increase in the
spiritual, political, social, and economic strength of individuals and
communities. It involves the empowered developing confidence in their
own capacities.
that will provide them with the self-esteem and community-building
activities to truly believe that their lives can be different, that
they can be anything they want to be in this world through
commitment, hard work, dedication, and an equal opportunity to
pursue their dreams.
And, we need your help.
These photos of Blackmon Road were taken
between 2002-2005
Below Photos: Jim Stratakos
Photo below Tom Aggeles 2003
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