Aberdeen Gardens – Hampton VA

Description

Originally named Newport News Homesteads, “Aberdeen Gardens was a New Deal planned community initiated by Hampton Institue (now Hampton University), designed specifically for the resettlement of African-American workers in Newport News and Hampton. In 1934, the Hampton Institute secured a $245,000 federal grant to create the housing development. It was the only Resettlement Administration community for blacks in Virginia and only the second neighborhood in the nation for blacks financed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Subsistence Homestead Project.

The Aberdeen neighborhood was designed by Hillyard R. Robertson, a black architect from Howard University. It became a model resettlement community in the United States. Charles Duke, a black architect, was name architect-in-charge to design and manage the construction of the composed of 158 brick houses on large lots and the Aberdeen Elementary School. The seven streets, excluding Aberdeen Road, are named for prominent African Americans: (1) Lewis Road, (2) Weaver Road, (3) Walker Road, (4) Mary Peake Boulevard, (5) Davis Road, (6) Russell Road, and (7) Langston Boulevard.

The site was added to the Virginia Landmark Register on March 10, 1994 and to the National Register of Historic Places on May 26, 1994.

The Aberdeen Historic District was begun in 1934 and was finished in 1937. The 440-acre subdivision includes 158 single family homes; one school; and a vital commercial center.”   (https://aberdeengardens.org/)