The Village of Alger in west central Ohio is small: Just about 800 people call the community home.
鈥淲e have nothing. We have nothing to hang our hat on,鈥� said Village Administrator Paul Osborne. 鈥淲e鈥檙e surrounded by what they call the muck around here.鈥�
That muck was once good for onion farming, but these days, the village is gaining notoriety for something else.
鈥淚f you go on the , there's one notable resident 鈥� one! 鈥� and it's ,鈥� said David Strittmatter, a history professor at Ohio Northern University.
When he found out the baseball Hall-of-Famer hailed from a village so close to ONU, he got to work with local leaders and the county historical museum to recognize him. He and art professor Melissa Eddings-Mancuso even got a from Forecast Public Art to do so.
They started fixing up Alger Village Park in Brown鈥檚 memory.
鈥淎 new outfield fence is going to be going up,鈥� Strittmatter explained. 鈥淲e also are building a terrace around this historical marker.鈥�
But little did they know the controversy the idea would cause.
Pushback from village council
At first, the village council rallied behind the effort and unanimously passed a resolution to rename the park after Brown.
But in the weeks that followed, that decision didn鈥檛 sit well with everyone.
A resident started a petition not to rename the park. Opponents said they鈥檇 never heard of Ray Brown or that they could think of other people just as deserving of the honor. Village officials said some residents were resistant to change.
So at its next meeting, the .
Councilwoman Linda Dienstberger supported both the original resolution and its reversal.
鈥淚 talked to the elderly people that lived in this town and I asked them what they thought about it,鈥� she said. 鈥淎nd they thought, 鈥榃ell, it's the Village of Alger Park,鈥� and I thought, 鈥榃ell, the elderly people, they have a say.鈥欌��
Rick Onions, another council member, was appalled. He was one of two to vote against the reversal.
鈥淚 couldn鈥檛 hold it back anymore. I had to say that I felt like the outside world would look at us 鈥� no matter what the reason was that we were changing the name back to Alger Park 鈥� that they would look at us like we were the biggest racist community ever,鈥� he said.
The aftermath
On platforms like and , allegations of racism abounded.
According to reporting from regional radio station WKTN, opponents firmly . But Eddings-Mancuso from ONU, says it鈥檚 hard not to wonder about the pushback.
鈥淭he question that comes bubbling up in my mind is: if Ray Brown were white and as equally accomplished a baseball player, would the trajectory of his memorial be different in this area?鈥� she said. 鈥淲ould there have been something named after him earlier?鈥�
"If Ray Brown were white and as equally accomplished a baseball player, would the trajectory of his memorial be different in this area?Melissa Eddings-Mancuso
Eventually, the village council reversed course again, this time passing an ordinance to permanently rename the green space, Ray Brown Memorial Park.
Longtime resident Jerry Cramer thinks that was the right thing to do. But he鈥檚 disappointed in the way the conversation devolved.
鈥淚n today's world, it seems like people can't have a dialogue without taking sides,鈥� he said. 鈥淚t just seems like, 鈥榊ou鈥檙e either on my side or I hate you,鈥� and that's crazy. That's crazy. We should be able to disagree without contempt or any ill feelings toward one another. That鈥檚 what this country was based on.鈥�
Council members say, at this point, the controversy seems to have died down. The project is moving ahead, with a grand opening of the revamped park planned for next summer.
