Have you head the story of how the Pentagon was built?

1863: The federal government established Freedman’s Village on the former Arlington plantation for formerly enslaved people.

It grew into a Black community with homes, schools, churches and institutions.

1900: The government closed it and removed the remaining residents. Some families and descendants rebuilt nearby, including in Queen City.
Arlington National Cemetery

By 1940, East Arlington and Queen City had 903 residents in 218 households, overwhelmingly Black.

Then the Pentagon arrived.

The federal government used eminent domain to seize the communities for the Pentagon’s roads, parking lots and supporting infrastructure.

The Library of Congress describes East Arlington/Queen City as an African American community “seized by eminent domain for the building of the Pentagon parking lots and roads.”
Library of Congress

About 900 people were displaced.

Homeowners received an average of roughly $2,052.

Renters received no property compensation.

Residents had less than a month to leave, and construction began before everyone was gone.
Pentagon Master Plan

The loss was bigger than the check.

Property ownership meant the ability to build equity, borrow against it, improve it, rent it, pass it to children and remain invested as the land became more valuable.

The community also lost churches, businesses, customers, institutions and social networks built over generations.

The sequence is the story:

Formerly enslaved people built Freedman’s Village.

The government removed them.

Some rebuilt nearby.

The next Black community was removed for the Pentagon.

That is the same wealth mechanism we saw at Seneca Village#1553085:

Black families acquire property.
They build institutions.
Government ends their ownership.
The public project remains.
The community does not.

A family allowed to remain an owner can turn one generation’s property into the next generation’s equity, collateral and inheritance.

A family forced to start over loses that compounding path.

Black Arlington built twice. The federal government displaced it twice.

That is one way the racial wealth gap was made.