North Minneapolis park renamed after community activist
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Earlier this week in a north Minneapolis park, Floyd Smaller Jr. paid tribute to his late wife, the community activist Lorraine Smaller, at a ribbon cutting ceremony.
The Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board event celebrated the park’s $700,000 renovation and its new name, the Lorraine B. Smaller Park.
He told the small crowd of park board commissioners, neighborhood groups and family members about how the idea came about.
“When I was dying on my bed from COVID, I asked my sons, would you, could we, how can we name that park after your mom,” Smaller. said. His sons and other family members got on it and two years later — following the process to rename a park — they hit their goal.
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Lorraine Smaller, who died in February 2022, had a fondness for the park and her Willard Hay community. She founded the We Care Performing Arts Program, a summer education initiative for neighborhood youth held at the park.
She also advocated for increased investment and more timely waste management pick ups at the park, formerly known as Farwell Park. Drug use, at one point, was common there. Smaller helped to clean it up, her husband said.
“She found some guys out here smoking, some of them funny cigarettes and trashing the place,” he said. “For sure, she got them to work and helped clean up the place … [She] changed their attitude and their disposition.”
Minnesota Senate President Bobby Champion, DFL-Minneapolis, attended the ceremony, though he did not make a speech. She sometimes supported the summer programs out of her own pocket, Champion said. He testified on her behalf before the Park Board in support of renaming the park after Smaller.
“I am who I am today because of people like Lorraine Smaller,” Champion said. “Being a community mother and taking on children as your own and giving them direction and guidance and support. That’s Lorraine Smaller.”
The one-and-a-half-acre park is on North Sheridan Avenue near North 12th Avenue in Homewood. The park now has an expanded playground with new swings, including an accessible bucket swing; music elements, slides and a spinner.
The park also has bike racks, a bike fix-it station, new benches and a picnic area. The play area has been divided for two different age groups: 5-12-year-olds and 2-5-year-olds.
In the late 1980s, according to a Park Board web page, Lorraine Smaller founded the Hands On Child Development Center for youth struggling in public schools. The center eventually became the Cedar Hill Academy.
Her daughter-in-law, Martine Smaller, said “she’s known throughout north Minneapolis as that person that you can go to, you can get a job, you could get a good meal, you might find a place to stay.”
“She can take care of your children,” Martine Smaller said. “When you go and pick them up, then they don’t even want to leave.”
Champion said it’s makes sense the park she was active in is now named after her.
“When kids … grow up and ask the question, ‘who is Lorraine Smaller?, hopefully her story will be shared, and someone else will be inspired to emulate her life’s work.”