Community recognizes centennial birthday of neighborhood legend

He looked like a humble politician.

Wearing a crisp black suit and ironed tie he made his way through an eager crowd of all ages, shaking hands and flashing a wide dimpled smile. The man's presence was so large that you hardly noticed his small frame and rounded back.

It could have been a primary, but he had already won the people's affection and the low-ceilinged community room of the church was filled with a religious spirit.

Though life expectancy in 1902 was 47.3 years, Albert Hinds defied the ordinary and lived to celebrate his 100th birthday on Sunday at the Mount Pigsah African Methodist Episcopal Church on the corner of Witherspoon and Maclean streets. About 150 friends and relatives gathered to celebrate the countless contributions of a life spent mostly in Princeton.

"This is a very special occasion that will never occur again," Hinds joked, taking the microphone after receiving a final tribute.

And the Princeton Borough and Township chose to celebrate that occasion from now on by proclaiming April 14 Albert Hinds Centennial Day.

The day was named "to hail devotion and outstanding service to the Princeton community," said Princeton Borough Council president Mildred Trotman.

Hinds' service stems from a family legacy of contributions to both the town and the University.

Hinds' maternal grandfather, Robert Hall, an escaped slave who helped build the Brooklyn Bridge, planted a magnolia tree with President James McCosh on the path from Nassau Street to the University Chapel.

"The tree came in late one evening, and everybody wanted to go home, so nobody would stay," recalled Hinds' mother Sophie in an interview long ago. "But President McCosh had the pleasure of holding [the tree] while my father planted it."

As early as fourth grade, Hinds became known around town riding a horse and buggy from a stable in what is now Palmer Square to pick people up at Princeton Junction.

"It was called the Owl Train, and I used to go over to meet it when it would come in at about 1:40 in the morning," Hinds said. "My night I would be there like any man answering calls all night long. I would just have a little oil on the side of the wagon."

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After attending Talladega College in Alabama and working at a YMCA for one year under the federal Works Progress Administration in Atlanta, Hinds came back to Princeton and ran a youth program at the town's segregated YMCA.

He worked as a letter carrier for the postal service and an exterminator at the Trenton State Psychiatric Hospital and was the only black man on the Borough zoning board for 20 years.

Hinds has spent his entire life in a small, crowded neighborhood bringing continued energy to what older residents call a slowly disappearing world.

As the younger generation of African Americans leave the neighborhood between John and Witherspoon streets, Hinds, the community historian, links the present and future of Princeton's black community to its past.

"Most of the time when something's 100, it's hard to touch, like a memorial or a monument," said Hinds' nephew Nathaniel Allman who traveled to the party from Brooklyn. "But he's living history."