VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — There's a new honor for the historic African-American Seatack community: a new book is in the works that showcases its rich history.
Local historian Edna Hawkins-Hendrix has been collecting pictures and history of the Seatack community of Virginia Beach for decades.
"This is the Seatack firemen — this photograph was taken in 1948," said Hawkins-Hendrix as she held another photograph (pictured below).
Hawkins-Hendrix and Jacqueline Malbon are working on a new book because they say that there is a lot of history that has been overlooked.
"It's called 'A Tapestry of Black Perseverance' because that is what Seatack is about," Hawkins-Hendrix said. "Seatack had its own fire station, Seatack had its own church, Seatack had a funeral home. It provided its own schools."
Hawkins-Hendrix gestured to one particular black-and-white photograph, shown below, of a segregated classroom of students at Seatack School in 1955.
"I look at [the children's] clothes and I look at... I can see where their parents worked very hard for them to be dressed like that," she said.
That picture is from a building that is currently the Virginia Beach Law Enforcement Training Academy right off of Birdneck Road, but back in 1952, it opened up as Seatack School, but that was not the first Seatack Elementary.
Back in the 1920s, those Black kids would have started out in a one-room schoolhouse for grades one through six on property that's now home to the Seatack Rec Center, named after Joseph Grimstead Sr., the founder of the all-Black Seatack Volunteer Fire Department.
Hawkins-Hendrix also has old photos of those firefighters. As she examined them with admiration, I asked her what came to mind when she looked at those photos.
"Determination!" she responded. "Because you had to have that to do what they did. They raised money and supported themselves with that fire station. This was an all-volunteer station."
She has a picture of one of their firetrucks, pictured below, nicknamed Big Bertha.
"...their wives helped them raise the money to purchase that," Hawkins-Hendrix explained.
She called their wives the "backbone of the Seatack firemen."
"...The ladies are the ones who went out there and raised that money for them. They did all that cooking and baking, raffles and bake sales," said Hawkins-Hendrix.
The Seatack influence is not only the focus of a new book: the Seatack community recently got listed as a historic district in the Virginia Landmarks Register.
Virginia Beach
Family, former students remember VB's first Black chorus teacher
I asked Hawkins-Hendrix what the historic district designation means to community members.
"You have a history — your history is finally being recognized," she answered.
Malbon says they also want Seatack's rich history available to local students.
Watch related story: Family & former students remember the life of Virginia Beach's first Black chorus teacher
"[I want students] to be able to see it, to hear it, to know about it, and to know that [the Seatack community] did make significant contributions throughout the city," said Malbon.
Hawkins-Hendrix believes it's important to expose young African American kids in Virginia Beach to this history, "to show them the struggle, the struggle of their ancestors and what they did to make a better life for them."
Both say they would like to see a museum showcase all the pictures and history they have documented on the Seatack community. Their new book is due out in April.
