Lynwood Park Community Day will take place at 12 p.m. on May 6 in celebration of DeKalb’s oldest African American neighborhood.
The day will begin with the Cross Keys High School marching band leading a parade from Windsor Parkway to Lynwood Recreation Center, followed by an afternoon of art, a kids area and free food.
Grand marshalls DeKalb County CEO Michael Thurmond and Stonecrest Mayor Jazzmin Cobble will join Brookhaven City Council members Linley Jones, John Funny and Madeleine Simmons.
Pat Jones, who grew up in Lynwood Park and started the event in 1976, will also be in the parade.
Event chair Janice Duncan, who has been organizing Lynwood Park Community Day for 20 years, said the event draws between 300 and 500 people from the neighborhood and across DeKalb County.
Kathy Wells, president of Lynwood Park Foundation, said the event recognizes the first Black families who moved to the neighborhood in the 1930s. Because of the founding families, she said Lynwood Park became a community known for its churches, the Little Red Schoolhouse, and the Twelve Ladies Sewing Club who petitioned the county for infrastructure and services.
“We celebrate our school, we celebrate our former teachers, churches, politicians, people who have accomplished things in our lives, all people, all walks of life,” Wells said.
The event has become like a reunion for former neighbors.
“When gentrification occurs, there’s a lot of displacement. People go through a separation. When we come back to Lynwood Park, it’s like a family reunion,” Wells said.
Little Zion Baptist Church and China Grove First Missionary Church will be recognized for their 100th year in operation.
