Before it was a shopping center, the area currently occupied by the Promenade at Brentwood was known as Evans Howard Place. In 1997, developers bought out the homes that had kept middle-class Black families thriving there for generations.

In 1998, Brentwood officials quietly commemorated a plaque set on a small rock near the shopping center’s exit. The rock was so out of the way — tucked between a lighting store and liquor market — that Allison Reed didn’t know it even existed until efforts to

The shopping center known as the Promenade at Brentwood was once a prominent African-American neighborhood. The historic Evens-Howard Place neighborhood in Brentwood was home to generations of middle class African-American families for 90 years.

On Wednesday’s St. Louis on the Air, host Don Marsh discussed the history of Evens-Howard Place with local writer Beth Miller, who’s researched the neighborhood. Also joining the discussion were Olivette Thompson, former resident of the neighborhood and

The historic Evens-Howard Place neighborhood in Brentwood was home to generations of middle class African-American families for 90 years. More than two dozen former residents of the neighborhood and many others came to hear Brentwood resident, Beth Miller, host a discussion on life in the neighborhood.

Miller spent two years getting to know some of the former residents in a study, and brought a panel of them together at the Brentwood Recreation Center on Sunday to talk about their life in the n