Hobson City residents paint ‘Black Towns Matter’ on city’s main street

CALHOUN COUNTY, Ala. (WBRC) - Hobson City residents celebrated Juneteenth with one simple message: Black Towns Matter.

On Friday, the town celebrated with a “Black Towns Matter” event.

They marked off one block of the city's main street, Martin Luther King Boulevard, to use highway-grade paint to put the words "Black Towns Matter" on the pavement.

Everyone from young children to the city's mayor, Alberta McCrory, grabbed brushes and rollers and got in on the act.

They all told us they just wanted to celebrate the city's heritage as the oldest black town in Alabama, being founded in 1899.

“And we know this place floods, but it can’t flood what’s in our spirit, and it can’t flood what’s in our hearts, it can’t flood what’s in our minds once we see that out there. So, this is who we are, you know. We keep coming back,” McCrory told reporters before picking up a paint roller.

Two artists with connections to the area painted the outlines to the words, while residents used yellow and red paint to fill them in.

McCrory says she plans to have another section of the street painted with the words “Black Lives Matter” on a future date.

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