CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Bank of America Stadium is built directly atop a relic of segregated healthcare: Good Samaritan Hospital, the first private hospital built in North Carolina to serve Black patients. Built in 1891, this historic hospital was one of the oldest of its kind in the United States.
Charlotte's Brooklyn community was built by men and women freed from slavery in the late 1800s. Like many Black communities around the state, it was forced into an awful geographical location – on low-lying land where flooding, sewage and sanitation issues made life hazardous.
The hospital grounds became the site of one of the "most horrific racial incidents in Charlotte's history," according to Dan Aldridge, professor of History and Africana Studies at Davidson College.
WRAL-TV, the NBC affiliate in Raleigh, documented the history of the Brooklyn neighborhood and the stadium that would follow as part of their documentary "Ghosts in the Stadium." Visit WRAL.com to read more.
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