Sterling Terrain V02 - Flipbook - Page 14
12 | Sterling College
Hayfield-Dundee:
The Troubled Waters of
a Changing Landscape
Written By
Sally Rother ‘23
The small residential area of Hayfield-Dundee, where I live, sits in the
southwestern corner of the Highlands
of Louisville neighborhood, resting
just north of the Watterson Expressway, which cuts through the landscape as a moat surrounds a castle.
Hayfield-Dundee, therefore, is a liminal space, the water splashing on the
shore of the predominately white, middle class Highlands. More of a highway
buffer zone than a neighborhood, it is
home to a collection of misfit residents,
whose sparse canopy and bald streets
pale in comparison to the winding treelined roads that give the Highlands its
character. Together with the highway,
Hayfield-Dundee is a clear physical and
ideological dividing line between socioeconomic classes–but why did this line
develop here?
For Hayfield-Dundee, development and
expansion seem to have been shaped in
part by the influence of early residents,
socio-political issues such as war and
race, and the changing rules of land use
in the city of Louisville, Kentucky.
To begin to understand the reasons for
the spatial distribution of this area, especially the placement of the highway,
it’s necessary to examine the land’s prior function. Hayfield-Dundee, like most
of Jefferson County, was previously
farmland, but unique to it is the prominent landowner of what was once Hayfield Farm. Dr. Charles Short (1794-1865),
botanist and professor at the University
of Louisville, inherited his uncle’s swath
of land in 1849 in addition to purchasing
the adjacent area after retiring. Short’s
high standing in the community is evi-
dent in his obituary, which states his
many accomplishments as an academic, scientist, and founding figure in the
higher education system of Louisville,
whose “courteous deportment made
him a favorite alike with his pupils and
his colleagues ... A kinder heart never
vibrated in a human breast” (“Obituary
of Charles Short” 178). Hayfield House
on Tyler Lane, where Short lived, is today a recognized historical landmark
(Marsteller) that was “furnished in the
best Kentucky style, and overlooked a
rich lawn of almost perpetual verdure”
(“Obituary of Charles Short” 176).
care was being placed to maximize the
city’s investments, including the placement of infrastructure and development.
One method that arose from the ban
on residential segregation was zoning,
which graded areas of the city on a scale
of A-D, based on race and class demographics, essentially “a form of residential apartheid” (Poe). A 1937 redlining
map (redlining refers to the specific low
grading of black neighborhoods) gave
an A-rating to the modern day Highlands, directly north of Hayfield-Dundee,
a B-rating to the east, and a C-rating to
the southeast, while other areas that
did not belong to Louisville yet were not
rated (“New Map of Greater Louisville
Kentucky”). Hayfield-Dundee did not receive a rating, as it still existed outside
city limits.
The narrative of Dr. Short’s wealth and
his high esteem in the community was
an early step in the area’s unique development in the years following his death
in 1865. In 1913, almost fifty years later,
the land was divided between a few new
landowners, including notable Louisville
families Tyler and Bernheim (“Plate 042”),
but the parcels were still agrarian in use
and the largest in comparison to adjacent properties. Meanwhile, change was
on the horizon for Louisville residential
development. In 1917, residential segregation was banned in Louisville, leading real estate agents and city planners
to seek out new areas and legislation
loopholes. One of these areas bordered
Hayfield-Dundee to the east, destined
to become “three adjacent subdivisions,
which included most of the area bounded by Tyler Lane, Tremont Drive, Dahlia
Avenue and Bardstown Road,” and advertised as ‘just outside the city limits’
but with ‘city water, electricity available
and excellent car service’” (Brother 354).
As the 1920s recovered from WWI, “the
county grew significantly. Growth was
not, however, in rural farm-related enterprises, but rather in outlying suburban neighborhoods, connected to the
city by streetcar lines and the interurban
train system” (Brother 124).
When the construction of the Inner Belt
(proto-Watterson Expressway) began in
1948, developers certainly would have
looked at race and class divisions when
deciding location. The A-rated Highlands would stay inside the highway.
Parts of the C-rated area would be torn
up for the highway itself. Modern day
Newburg, directly southwest of Hayfield-Dundee, did not have a rating, as it
also lay outside the city limits, but would
later be outside the highway; once home
to the Petersburg Community of Freed
Slaves, a former swamp area known as
the Wet Woods, it’s easy to imagine what
rating it would have received (“Petersburg”). Hayfield-Dundee was stuck in
the center, the Inner Belt placed along
its southern border, just a few wealthy
landowners away from getting caught
on the other side, where it would have
eventually been turned into commercial
buildings as part of the lower-income
neighborhood of Buechel (Bergmann).
Just like that, the on-paper ratings had
morphed into a physical divide in the
name of infrastructure improvement.
The increasing emigration of whites to
suburban areas would eventually mean
a need for better transportation systems - specifically, highways. By the
Great Depression of the 1930s, great
The effect of power structures on the
changing relationship to land and food
in this area can also be told through
my great grandfather’s story, who lived
on Shannon Drive in what remained of