The historic Afro-American Sons and Daughters Hospital has been demolished with work crews anticipating being finished with debris clean-up by the end of the week.
As the sound of bulldozers echoed through the neighborhood, many citizens were saddened to see a part of history slowly being erased.
“I knew the building was too far gone to save,” said one man, watching the crews demolish what remained of the structure. “But it is still sad to see it completely gone.”
In 1924, T.J. Huddleston Sr., founded the Afro-American Sons and Daughters, a fraternal organization in Mississippi and one of the leading black voluntary associations in the state. Organized in 1924, it had 35,000 members by the 1930s.
In 1928, the association opened the Afro-American Hospital of Yazoo City, the first hospital for blacks in the state. Dr. Lloyd Tevis Miller (L.T. Miller), co-founder of the Mississippi Medical and Surgical Association, the state’s largest and oldest organization representing African American health professionals, was recruited by Huddleston to serve as the facility’s first director.
The hospital offered both major and minor surgery. The facility’s primary mission was to serve its members but, given the lack of quality health care facilities available to blacks at the time, the hospital served not only individuals from Yazoo City and the Delta region but other parts of Mississippi and the South as well.
The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2006 and was also included on a list of 10 Most Endangered Historic Sites in Mississippi.
Portions of a local historical landmark and site were left in ruins following a fire in October of 2022 that investigators believe started from a vagrant who was living inside the abandoned facility.
Prior to the building being demolished, Mayor David Starling said he would consider the city using some of its own funds to create some sort of memorial dedicated to the structure.
“Even if it would mean us spending some of our city dollars, we need to have some kind of memorial other than just a wall,” Starling said, during a previous board meeting. “Truly build something that is representative of what the hospital used to be. I had several family members born there. I have heard it was an awesome hospital. The legacy was that it was the first African American hospital in the state of Mississippi.”
Alderman Charlie Jenkins suggested a landmark be constructed at the site.
“Once they remove it, we should put a landmark up,” Jenkins said. “We can find pictures of the old hospital and put them in that landmark. I suggest that maybe we put a landmark with pictures and names.”
Many efforts have been made over the past several years to save the local landmark. Following the facility’s closure and the eventual passing of the property from private owners into the hands of the city, the hospital had been included in a federal grant program dating back to 2016. Beginning in 2016, the hospital was included in the Environmental Protection Agency’s Brownfields Program.
However, going back even earlier when the hospital was named within the grant program, the site remained abandoned. No significant action was seen at the historic site as the facility became consumed by vagrants, vegetation and decay. Based on much of the city’s claims dockets, the majority of funds were used for “grant management, community engagement and grant expense.” No “redevelopment” expenses were noted.
