For decades, a hulking brick building sat shuttered in the middle of Brownsville. Once a Masonic Lodge with boarded-up windows, the structure had long been a vacant reminder of neglect in this part of west Pensacola.
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Now, sunlight streams through new windows, an elevator connects the two floors, and 5,000 books line the shelves. The 8,000-square-foot building has been reborn as the first library in Brownsville’s history.
“I thought it was a barn before,” said Ruel Salazar, minister of Brownsville Church of Christ, recalling his first impression when he moved into the community. “It’s a huge building, and there’s nothing there. Then they start gutting it out. And then I saw ‘Brownsville Library’ and thought, ‘Oh, great. That’s really great.'”
The library’s first floor includes a public reading space and a cafe, while the second floor is designed for senior activities, children’s programs, and classes. Above the entrance, an archway shaped like an open book welcomes visitors.
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Pastor Evon Horton, who has led Brownsville Church for nearly 20 years, said this place will answer a deep need.
“The illiteracy of high school grads in this community is horrible,” said Dr. Horton. “If you prepare them as preschoolers, and you have a place for them to go, and you give them an appetite for reading, they will be a success when they graduate high school.”
For parents like Manetta Jones, who has lived in Brownsville for seven years, the library means opportunity.
“My kids will be able to come and do homework,” Jones said. “They’ll be able to come and get on the computer and research, get books. Before, we didn’t have a library. And it’s right here close to home.”
Clinton Brown, who lives three blocks away, said the library fills a gap.
“We’ve been missing a library,” he said. “I mean, there’s one downtown, but I’d rather be somewhere closer. This is walking distance. I got a nephew who loves to read, and that’s going to really excite him.”
Escambia County Commissioner Lumon May, who pushed for the project alongside Horton, said the building’s transformation carries symbolic weight.
“Many people don’t know the history of this building,” May said. “It was once a place where the clansmen met. It once was a place of Scottish rite, where Masonics met. But today it’s been transformed into a building of hope.”
Horton said some questioned why so much investment was going into Brownsville, but he sees it as part of a bigger plan.
“If you can improve a community, you reduce those costs,” Horton said. “So the criticism I got was, 'Why are we putting so much money in Brownsville?' Because I said it’ll pay off in the end. It will actually reduce the demand on services… Because we’re uplifting a neighborhood and a community. It’s the greater good concept.”
For neighbors like Salazar, the change to Brownsville is already visible.
“It used to be better,” Salazar said. “It was getting worse, and now it’s getting better because of these amenities. And hopefully they will maintain it.”
For a community that has never had a library, Brownsville’s first feels like a new beginning, and for many residents, the opening was more than overdue.
