A community center in honor of Zora Neale Hurston is in the works at the former nursing home in Fort Pierce where the internationally renowned author died. Plans call for a museum-quality exhibit of the life and times of Hurston and the Lincoln Park community in the late 1950s, said Marvin Hobson, president of the Zora Neale Hurston Florida Education Foundation.
There will also be a coffee shop and a “Dreamers and Poets Garden” on the grounds at 809 N. 9th Street, Hobson said.
“We want people to just come and enjoy, have a cup of coffee, and learn more about Zora Neale Hurston and get engaged in all the wonderful activities we’ll be having throughout the year to commemorate her legacy,” Hobson said.
An open house is planned for September to show the building to the community, Hobson said. The once annual Zorafest, which has been on hiatus for several years, is to resume in March.
Hurston is considered a central figure in the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s which influenced generations of writers and artists. Hurston’s best-known book, “Their Eyes Were Watching God,” was published in 1937 and made into a television movie in 2005.
Hurston’s work is still inspiring artists and attracting international interest.
Saxophonist J.D. Allen recently released an album entitled “Barracoon,” which was inspired by Hurston’s book about an Alabama man thought to be among the last Africans brought to the United States on the last known slave ship.
A team of French television journalists recently visited Fort Pierce to research a documentary about Hurston, Hobson said.
Fort Pierce and St. Lucie County have embraced Hurston’s legacy in Lincoln Park, where she worked as a newspaper reporter and schoolteacher in the last years of her life. County commissioners last week agreed to transfer the 3,234-square-foot building where she died to the Zora Neale Hurston Florida Education Foundation. The property includes a 2/3 acre lot.
The commissioners scrapped earlier plans to redevelop the building into a center for homeless veterans because of the costs, said County Administrator Howard Tipton.
It had previously been the home of the Agape Senior Recreation Center.
The 60-year-old building needs about $70,000 worth of renovations, including new plumbing, flooring, windows and air conditioning, Hobson said.
The Hurston Foundation is raising money and accepting volunteer services from contractors to get the work done, Hobson said. The foundation is also seeking a variety of state and federal historic preservation grants.
In addition, the foundation is working with former state Rep. Larry Lee’s “Restore the Village” initiative, which aims to promote public safety and community pride in Lincoln Park.
The building is already part of the Zora Neal Hurston Dust Tracks Heritage Trail, a walking tour of Lincoln Park buildings where Hurston lived and worked.
Marjorie Harrell, who had Hurston as a substitute teacher at Lincoln Park Academy in the late 1950s, said the community center will become an international tourist attraction.
“We are the only city that has all these buildings that Zora touched and walked in,” Harrell told the commissioners on July 2. “People come from around the world.”
Hobson, an English teacher at Indian River State College who specializes in Hurston’s work, said he brings a class of literature students to the building each semester to learn about Hurston and Lincoln Park.
“The main thing is we want the community to know this is the community’s building,” Hobson said. “A majority of the building will be a community center where we want to have activities for all generations.”
A woman who worked in the nursing home and knew Hurston is helping put together the museum exhibit for the community center, Hobson said.
“People come from all over the world to learn about Zora,” Hobson said. “So we want to be a place where people can come and learn about those last few years of her life and be introduced to a Zora that maybe they hadn’t seen before in the books or any other platform.”
“So that’s really our vision, to create that museum experience for people so that when they walk into that room where Zora lived they can really feel her presence there and what life was like in the 1950s in Fort Pierce.”
