Zora Neale Hurston’s Legacy Lives On with Preservation of Her Final Residence

Greater than 80 years after she gave the world “Their Eyes Have been Watching God,” Harlem Renaissance icon Zora Neale Hurston’s residence has formally been preserved. Nestled in a traditionally Black group often known as Lincoln Park, the standard Fort Pierce, Florida, residence was lately acquired by The Conservation Fund to make sure its safety… and a serious a part of Black historical past.  

The Conservation Fund (TCF), a U.S. nonprofit targeted on financial growth and environmental preservation, partnered with the Zora Neale Hurston Florida Training Basis (ZNHFEF) to amass the property in September 2024. This humble home — constructed and given rent-free by her buddy, native physician Dr. Clem C. Benton — was the place she lived from 1957 till her demise in 1960. Now, it’s being introduced again to life as a customer and schooling middle turning into a key cease on the Mud Tracks Heritage Path, honoring key websites from her time in the neighborhood.

Although she was celebrated through the Harlem Renaissance, Hurston spent her closing years largely forgotten by the literary world. She wrote weekly columns for the Fort Pierce Chronicle — a job she was provided by native writer C.E. Bolen — taught briefly at Lincoln Park Academy, and labored day jobs to make ends meet, all whereas engaged on her unfinished novel titled “The Lifetime of Herod The Nice.” Regardless of being recovered from a hearth, the piece was nonetheless revealed January 2025, per NPR. 

“I discovered Zora in Cocoa, the place she was doing a little writing for the Pittsburgh Courier, I believe,” C.E. Bolen acknowledged in a Fort Pierce Tribune article. “I mentioned ‘Why don’t you come to Fort Pierce and work for me?’ and she or he did… She amazed me. You might be taught so much from speaking to her… She carried quite a lot of good info along with her to her grave,” his assertion concluded. 

And after years of her laborious work, the preservation of her legacy is properly deserved. 

“Zora Neale Hurston’s closing residence deserves to be a part of her enduring legacy,” mentioned ZNHFEF President Marvin Hobson, per Amsterdam Information. “A house is a spot of security and refuge. As a author in a male-dominated business who labored throughout Jim Crow America, it’s straightforward to think about the peace and luxury that Zora would have sought at her Fort Pierce residence. We’re honored to associate with The Conservation Fund to make sure this property honors one of many best American writers of the twentieth century.” 

You could know Zora Neale Hurston for iconic works just like the 1937 traditional “Their Eyes Have been Watching God,” which introduced the Black Southern essence to life. However she wrote way more, together with novels like “Jonah’s Gourd Vine,” folklore collections like “Mules and Males,” and her autobiography, “Mud Tracks on a Highway.” Her capacity to mix storytelling and anthropology made her work actually one among a form.

Amid a political local weather that seeks to bury Black historical past and its accomplishments, preserving Hurston’s closing residence looks like a radical act. She gave the world tales that refused to be silenced — and now, her house is being restored to supply the identical form of inspiration she carried along with her all her life.