East Central

East Central, east of downtown across the Maumee, is one of the city's historically Black neighborhoods, and its institutions carry that history: the Jennings Center, Turner Chapel AME, the African/African-American Historical Museum at the Phyllis Wheatley Center, Ellis Funeral Home, and Nuckols Park, named for John Nuckols, Fort Wayne's first Black city councilman — his story is told in the People and Government sections. The East Park Planning Alliance's 2005 plan for East Central was adopted into the city's comprehensive plan. In the City's Shout-Out: Fort Wayne public art program, the neighborhood associations of East Central and Harvester worked with the City from the fall of 2023; the program's second-year project, Julie Wall's mural "Rich History, Bright Future" along the Coombs Street retaining walls, was dedicated on June 29, 2026, its imagery running from the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma's ribbon work to Nuckols and the neighborhood's landmark buildings. In 2026 the City's Neighborhood Heat Mapping work in East Central was among the efforts recognized with a U.S. Conference of Mayors Climate Protection Award.

Sources: City of Fort Wayne, Shout-Out: East Central Neighborhood (Engage Fort Wayne) and mural dedication release, June 29, 2026; City of Fort Wayne ordinance codifying the East Park Planning Alliance plan (2005); City of Fort Wayne release, 2026 Mayors' Climate Protection Awards.