Exerpts, Allensworth Feasibility Study

In 1906, Lieutenant Colonel Allen Allensworth, a minister and teacher and the highest ranking African American officer of his time, retired from the military and came to California where he joined Professor William Payne, an educator; Dr. Peck, a minister; Mr. Palmer, a Nevada miner; and Mr. H. Mitchell, a Los Angeles realtor, to form the California Colony and Home Promoting Association. In 1908, they established the town of Allensworth, a town built on the idea of dignity of the human spirit. The African American people who settled in Allensworth wished to build a place of their own where they could control their own destiny and where they could achieve their full potential, free from discriminatory laws and practices of the time.

The town of Allensworth thrived through the 1930s but eventually fell into decline. On Sept. 14, 1914, Colonel Allensworth was struck and killed by a motorcyclist in Los Angeles. Along with the shock of their founder’s death, such blows as the loss of a planned vocational school, a diminishing water supply, the re-location of a railroad station, and the migration of young people to urban areas for employment, took their toll on the colony.

In 1969, Dept. of Parks and Recreation Director, William Penn Mott, Jr., led the way toward acquisition and preservation of Allensworth, the only town in California to be founded, financed, and governed by African Americans. Mott believed that State Parks lacked attention to contributions made by African Americans to California history. An advisory committee was authorized by Governor Reagan and appointed by Mott to guide a plan for the acquisition, preservation, and development of Allensworth as a state historic park. By 1972, a plan had been adopted that called for acquisition of some 240 acres at Allensworth plus an extensive program of restoration of key buildings in the old town. Exerpts from that Feasibility Study are displayed here. The plan also called for construction of a museum, library, and research center that would tell the story of Colonel Allensworth and other African American pioneers and leaders in California history. In October 1976, Allensworth State Historic Park was officially dedicated as a unit of the State Park System.