Africville Museum

Africville Museum occupies a replica of the Seaview United Baptist Church — the spiritual heart of Africville, demolished along with the rest of the community between 1964 and 1970 when the City of Halifax cleared the area to build the A. Murray MacKay Bridge. The original church was built in 1916; the replica opened in 2012 as part of the city's formal apology and reparations to displaced Africville residents and their descendants. The museum documents the history of one of the oldest Black communities in Canada and the civic decision-making that erased it.

The exhibits combine photographs, oral history recordings, and personal objects from the original community. The story is a significant one in Canadian history — a case study in how urban renewal policies of the 1960s were used to displace communities of colour. The site overlooks the Bedford Basin and the bridge that replaced the neighbourhood. It is a twenty-minute drive from downtown Halifax. Former residents and their descendants sometimes volunteer at the museum, and the conversations they offer are among the most valuable things in the building.

things to do museum
A story
Africville was a Black community established on the shores of the Bedford Basin in the early 1800s by freed Black loyalists. For 150 years, the city of Halifax refused to extend water, sewer, or garbage services to the neighbourhood, then used that same lack of services as justification for declaring it a slum and demolishing it in the 1960s. The city offered residents moving assistance — in many cases delivered in garbage trucks. A formal apology and reparations came only in 2010.