93-year-old Catherine Starr takes in the moment as her family's legacy is honored with the renaming of White Line Street to Starr Drive. The former street was a marker of segregation during Jim Crow. (DorMiya Vance/WABE)
On a partly cloudy afternoon, folks gathered at an intersection on Irving Street leading into a quiet neighborhood in Jonesboro.
While the sun played hide and seek, people sat under an orange canopy as city officials spoke at a podium in front of a covered street sign.
Jonesboro Mayor Donya Sartor (left) and state Sen. Gale Davenport (right) give remarks during the renaming ceremony of White Line Street to Starr Drive. (DorMiya Vance/WABE)
Here, officials reclaimed the town’s history by renaming a street that once divided Black and white communities during the Jim Crow era.
“Well, back in the day, it was just one street they call it White Line,” said Catherine Starr, a 93-year-old resident of Jonesboro.
Starr’s family has held deep ties to the Jonesboro community since then. Her ancestors planted their roots in the town around the 1900s, with the family becoming a pillar in the city’s church social community.
Starr sat in her wheelchair along the front row of the event as city officials counted down before unveiling the new street sign, which now reads “Starr Drive” to honor the legacy of the Starr family specifically.
Among the crowd, Catherine Starr (center right) looks on while attending the renaming ceremony of White Line Street to Starr Drive in honor of her family. (DorMiya Vance/WABE)
“I’m grateful. I am grateful to be here to see it,” Starr said.
The former street, White Line Street, was a physical divider of the neighborhood’s Black and white populations. The divider forced the Black community into Adamson’s White Line Colored Subdivision.
The subdivision was named after E. L. Adamson, a white landowner and developer. The street was also a long-lasting memory of redlining, which has detrimentally impacted Black and brown communities.
The idea of renaming the street was brought to the Jonesboro City Council around 2021. City officials say the charge was led by local pastor Rosemarie Green.
“We came across a little bit of information … where it actually said in Plat Book number two, page number one, ‘Adamson’s White Line Colored Subdivision.’ And so I immediately, you know, got a little rattled,” Green said. “And I said this needs to be changed.”
Jonesboro’s City Council voted and unanimously approved the name change around January of last year, according to Mayor Donya Sartor.
“I was just able to facilitate what the citizens desire, and that’s what a true elected official is. You take what the citizen wants, you articulate it to your council,” Sartor said. “If you’re lucky, like this situation, you get a unanimous vote, and then everybody comes out and shares in the celebration.”
And just before the rain fell, Catherine Starr was presented with a personal “Starr Drive” street sign as a historic memento.
