New hope for Pembroke Township

Across America, there are pockets of poverty, communities that have been left behind or deprived of the basics needed to develop, like Pembroke Township, a small community south of Chicago along the Indiana border. In this community, one-third of the families live below the poverty line. It is one of the poorest communities in the country, with a median income that is among the lowest.

In the 1860s, newly freed slaves — Freedmen — settled into the rich farmland of the region. It was a land of promise and opportunity....