The new Brandywine Village Welcome Center was fueled by Peg Tigue and her committee’s aspiration “to illuminate the diverse array of Colonial Delawareans who played pivotal roles in America’s quest for independence in 1776,” she said. Photo by Ken Mammarella.
Brandywine Village, a community just north of downtown Wilmington that traces its European roots back to about 1640, is boldly doing something about its future: running its own welcome center.
“We hope through history that we will encourage economic development,” said Brandywine Village resident Peg Tigue, who’s orchestrating the effort. “There’s so much to be proud of here.”
Welcome centers and visitor centers are mostly commonly run by governments and large nonprofits, such as chambers of commerce and convention and visitors bureaus.
The Brandywine Village Welcome Center, at 1883 Superfine Lane, hosts an open house 4-6 p.m. May 23, featuring the Choir School of Wilmington, Gov. John Carney, Wilmington Mayor Mike Purzycki and a food truck.
After the open house, the center will be staffed by volunteers 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. four days a week, Tigue said, either Wednesdays-Saturdays or Thursdays-Sundays.
The center is run by Brandywine Partners , which four years ago sprang out of Old Brandywine Village, which dates back to 1964. Both nonprofits promote the area to people and businesses.
The center is also run by W3R-DE, a nonprofit that promotes the Washington-Rochambeau Revolutionary Route National Historic Trail, which basically passes by the center’s front door.
Brandywine Village will get extra attention for the 200th anniversary of the Marquis de Lafayette’s Guest of the Nation tour.
Lafayette, according to Britannica.com , “distinguished himself among a large colorful group of European soldiers of fortune and idealists … to fight for American independence.”
He turned 20 on Sept. 6, 1777, the day he had a council of war with George Washington and other Colonial leaders at the Hale-Byrnes House near Newark.
In 1824, he returned to America, and events will follow his daily itinerary, including stopping at Brandywine Village on Oct. 6.
“Hundreds of events will trace Lafayette’s route on the exact dates he followed in 1824-25,” Newark Life wrote. “Delaware’s itinerary starts at noon on Sunday, Oct. 6 at the Robinson House near Claymont, moves down Route 13 to Brandywine Village (Lafayette slept here in 1777 at the home of Joseph Tatnall), heads west to the Delaware Historical Society and ends at Jessop’s Tavern in Old New Castle.”
“This is a big deal,” Kim Burdick, who is in charge of Delaware’s leg, said of the plans for this fall.
Brandywine Partners considers its marketing territory to be bound roughly by 14th, Washington and 24th streets and Clifford Brown Walk. That area has about 8,200 residents (more than 10% of Wilmington’s population), multiple businesses and many nonprofits, Tigue said, such as the Ministry of Caring and the Junior League of Wilmington.
The center’s creation benefits greatly from $106,000 in the state Bond Bill, as arranged by Sen. Darius J. Brown. Tigue said that money paid for renovating and furnishing 1,200 square feet of space.
Organizers have developed lesson plans for third- through sixth-graders for field trips. “We can teach them the lost history of African Americans,” Tigue said.
Brandywine Village history
A brochure describing a village walk starts in 1762 with the first millrace being dug to power flour mills (“superfine” is a grade of flour). Village factories also produced cotton textiles and cigars. The 1640 date comes from the application to be on the National Register of Historic Place s, which happened in 1971.
The brochure describes 15 sites that are “representative” of history in the village, which was annexed into Wilmington in 1869.
The center is building a library about Delaware history. It has art, posters and artifacts, and it is expecting more artifacts to be donated from the excavation of Villa Maria, a new Ministry of Caring project on Market Street to house low- and moderate-income seniors.
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The welcome center’s renovations were done by the Challenge Program, a nonprofit that provides vocational training. Tigue knew Challenge Program executive director Andrew McKnight from her time leading the Kalmar Nyckel, Delaware’s tall ship.
The Challenge Program was first a boatbuilding program, and both nonprofits operate out of Wilmington’s Seventh Street peninsula.
The Bond Bill money also paid for 10 security cameras and monitoring of camera footage.
The welcome center has received funding and material goods from WSFS, Bank of America, M&T Bank, Dollar General, ShopRite, the Wilmington Housing Authority, W3R-DE and the Jefferson Street Center.
Murals capture “the essence of every culture, often unsung heroes, who contributed to this monumental mission” of American independence, Tigue said. The First Rhode Island Regiment, comprising 300 African American Colonial freedom fighters, marched down Market Street in 1781 and returned in 1782. Ken Mammarella photo.
And it has received support from City Council members Latisha Bracy, Maria D. Cabrera, Shané N. Darby, Nathan Field, Zanthia Oliver and James Spadola.
Tigue said that Brandywine Village murals have inspired Field to get murals for Trolley Square.
Colourworks is renting the space to the center at a below-market rate, Tigue said, and the Delaware Horticultural Center landscaped Brandywine Mills Plaza, which on summer Tuesday evenings hosts music and a marketplace.
Tigue, who’s lived in Brandywine Village for 27 years and has been a businesswoman and nonprofit leader for much longer, felt that loss of some longtime businesses on Market Street is “really tragic” but expressed pleasure that “there’s a lot of revitalization” in the area.
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