The Kenilworth Project is an attempt to document and write about the history of the Kenilworth neighborhood and Fellowship Haven Church, and how the Lapp family and other church workers became a part of the neighborhood.
These are the two stories of Kenilworth that I want to tell. One, how an originally white suburb with world famous water gardens became a black, urban neighborhood with a reputation for drugs and violence, and how the residents banded together to turn that neighborhood around with innovative programs and with a trend-setting tenant management corporation. Two, how a few white, rural, covering-wearing, beard-growing, traditional Amish-Mennonite folk from Pennsylvania and the Midwest moved onto Douglas Street in Kenilworth and became an integral part of the neighborhood.
To tell these stories, I have been researching the history of the area by digging up newspaper articles, looking at maps, and by talking to and interviewing residents and former residents. A key part of this research is an oral history project, where I tape record interviews with people connected to Kenilworth and Fellowship Haven, preserving their memories that would otherwise be lost. When it is finished, this project will be archived at two DC libraries, where it will be available for historical and educational research.
All this research will, hopefully, feed into my own writing and lead to a book of creative nonfiction that, using a collage of essays, poetry, character sketches, memoir writing, physical and social history, journal entries, and oral history excerpts, will creatively tell the story of Kenilworth and of Fellowship Haven.
Keep in touch - Joe (lappjoe@yahoo.com)