Dallas, Lowe and Lincoln Mills closer to historic street signs
The preliminaries are nearly finished and the folks behind the movement to add the Dallas Mill Historical District to the growing list of Huntsville neighborhoods adorned with the city’s brown and white street signs are nearing their goal.
The Dallas Mill burned down years ago, but old-timers and more recent arrivals alike gathered at Jackson Way Baptist Church to hear details on where the project stands.
For Dallas Mill Village, wedged between Five Points and Lincoln Mill Village northeast of downtown, the only thing left now is for residents to choose the design they prefer and the City will handle the rest.
“The purpose of the meeting is to serve as a collaborative design session for new historic street signs,’’ City of Huntsville Preservation Planner Katie Stamps, a Madison native who now lives in District 2, told those gathered at the church.
Lawrence Hillis, a well-known veteran of the Huntsville Track Club, said it was retired pastor Larry Layne who first floated the idea of signs in Dallas Mill Village.
“I was born and grew up in the neighborhood,’’ Hillis told the audience. “I live on Ward Avenue right now, and Larry Lane is sitting right there. He was born and raised in the district. He went off to work, came back to Huntsville and retired. A couple of months ago he was driving around town and noticed all the historical signs on the street signs and everything. And he said, ‘Can’t we have something like that in this district.’’
Layne reached out to Stamps and David Little, the council member representing District 2, who was also born in Huntsville and recalled riding his bike to Star Market in Five Points to buy candy growing up.
“They met with us and they thought it was a pretty good idea, but we would want the community to have an input of some way or another – yes or no, or don’t care,’’ Hillis said. “But I see y’all here, so that’s a good sign.
There are currently 11 districts in the city on the national historic register.
Stamps stressed that unlike some of the districts — such as Five Points — that design reviews won’t be the case for Dallas Mill.
“I’m wearing two hats this evening,’’ Stamps said. “But one of the things that I realized when I started working for the city is that we have these brown, you know, kind of reddish brown historic street signs that we have put in all of our historic districts but the only three that don’t have them are three of our mill villages – Dallas, Lincoln, and Lowe. I was thinking that’s odd, and so we wanted to rectify that.’’
She added that once the Dallas Mill signage is up her office will start working on getting the same for Lincoln and Lowe Mill neighborhoods.
“We’re not here to talk about – I’m going to start telling you what kind of windows you can put in and what color you can paint your house. That’s not what this is. This is literally just to talk about getting street signs,” said Stamps. “Y’all are kind of our first that we’ve talked with of the mill villages. I’m gonna be having meetings as well with residents of the Lowe Mill area as well as Lincoln. So we will go through those processes later on.’’
The signage design Stamps displayed had obvious images – the Dallas Mill, the still-standing water tank that backs up to Lincoln Mill, area houses, and men and boys posing for a picture in front of the mill during a period when child labor laws weren’t a thing.
Some attendees at the Jackson Way meeting voted for their favorite photo.
The plan moving forward is to hold another town hall for those who missed the first.
However, Stamps said residents can “write-in’’ if they don’t like the original options. She can be reached at katherine.stamps@huntsvilleal.gov or at (256) 650-4779.
“There’s no cost to the neighborhood,’’ Stamps said. “And really this process is just to get your input.’’
