Back in April, Little Richard's boyhood home was moved from Macon’s Fifth Avenue and Middle Street to Craft Street.
Now, the home is renovated and will become a new resource center in Pleasant Hill.
“They said it couldn't be done. Moving, moving down Middle Street,” said community member Naomi Johnson. “And we're sitting in it right now.”
The Historic Penniman House is transforming into a community resource center that stores the history of Pleasant Hill.
“People in this community were very active in affairs. Not just affairs of the community, but of the city and of the state,” said community member Peter Givens.
Johnson and Givens are collecting artifacts to showcase the community where they've lived their entire lives.
“We'll have education, music, journalism [and] politics,” said Johnson.
The artifacts date back from the early 1920's to the Civil Rights movement before the I-16 / I-75 interchange split the community.
“We were truly unique; our neighborhood. We had an academy for the blind, we had a library, we had a hospital,” said Johnson.
Johnson hopes that the new 800-square foot center will be a beacon of hope and inspiration to younger generations.
“And our children can see no matter what street, lane, or wherever you live... you can still make accomplishments,” said Johnson.
In addition to the new resource center, the Pleasant Hill mitigation project will add two new parks in this community and build 17 new homes.
The Department of Transportation expects to finish the entire mitigation plan by summer 2018. The cost of the entire project is $500 million.
So far, there's no word on when the center will officially open to the public.