The Heart of a Community, the Soul of a Partnership

After 25 years leading Duke’s community efforts, Mayme Webb-Bledsoe leaves a legacy of building bridges with people

Mayme Webb-Bledsoe poses with her arms folded in front of Durham's iconic Lucky Strike tower.
Mayme Webb-Bledsoe worked to build relationships between Durham community members and Duke as Assistant Vice President for Duke-Durham Neighborhood Partnership & Community Development. Photo by Travis Stanley

Sometime after Mayme Webb-Bledsoe took a position with what is now called Duke Community Affairs at Duke University in 2000, she ran into someone in the grocery store from her old West End neighborhood.

“Have you turned on us, Mayme?” they asked. “What are y’all trying to do? We don’t quite understand it.”

In the neighborhood where Webb-Bledsoe grew up, the launch of the Duke-Durham Neighborhood Partnership (DDNP) sparked curiosity and questions. As one of the initiative’s leader, Webb-Bledsoe focused on building trust and fostering open communication, helping both the university and community grow together and create lasting, positive change.

“I had the pressure on myself to do right by a community that I loved,” said Webb-Bledsoe, whose fifth-floor office in the NC Mutual Life building is in the same tower where her mother once worked on the 11th floor in the 1960s.  “I was blessed and wanted to be put in a position where I could tend and shepherd that relationship to make sure that over the years what we value is working together and figuring out solutions together.”

Webb-Bledsoe, 68, is retiring from Duke at the end of June, leaving behind the legacy of her work with the Duke-Durham Neighborhood Partnership, where she focused on strengthening communication between six West End neighborhoods in Southwest Central Durham and Duke through establishing affordable housing, encouraging economic development, nurturing nonprofit sustainability and celebrating community traditions.

All were priorities of the community that Webb-Bledsoe, now the Assistant Vice President for the Duke-Durham Neighborhood Partnership & Community Development, worked to identify through extensive conversation with those who lived in the area – who were the very same people she grew up with. Two years of discussion yielded the Southwest Central Durham Quality of Life (QoL) project that targeted Durham’s Burch Avenue, West End and Lyon Park for housing due to high vacancy rates, significant levels of disrepair and vulnerability to gentrification. 

Mayme Webb-Bledsoe, center, worked to encourage conversation between Durham community members and Duke officials.
Webb-Bledsoe, left, worked on a Durham public art initiative with Barbara Lau, right. Photos courtesy of Barbara Lau

Fredrick Davis, pastor emeritus to Durham’s First Calvary Baptist Church, first met Webb-Bledsoe when she attended his church as a child. Their relationship grew as she worked with him at what is now known as West End Community Foundation, Inc. to restore the Community Family Life & Recreation Center at Lyon Park.

“You can’t have community partnership with people who are not knowledgeable of the community in which you are trying to partner,” Davis said. “You’ve got to have somebody who’s sensitive and compassionate toward that type of work.”

A portrait of Mayme Webb-Bledsoe standing before Durham's iconic Lucky Strike tower
Webb-Bledsoe says her time working to better Durham isn't done, even with her retirement from Duke looming. Photo by Travis Stanley

The Duke-Durham Neighborhood Partnership helped refurbish 140 affordable housing units in Southwest Central Durham through the QoL project and helped acquire 105 properties through the Southside Revitalization Project that were redeveloped. It also helped preserve the childhood home of civil rights activist Pauli Murray, which was deemed a National Historic Landmark in 2016.

“As Mayme concludes a distinguished career at Duke, I celebrate her as a respected connector and bridge-builder,” said Stelfanie Williams, Vice President for Community Affairs. “I’ve seen her authentic leadership, tenacity and poise cultivate shared visions for compromise, especially among those with diverse perspectives. Mayme’s generous and creative spirit is a model for all who aim to improve the quality of life with our neighbors in Durham and beyond. I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to have collaborated with and learned from her.” 

Webb-Bledsoe, a recipient of the Samuel DuBois Cook Society Community Betterment Award, is recognized for her outstanding service and deep commitment to the community. Her impact is visible on walls across Durham, where she partnered with Barbara Lau, director of community documentary projects at Duke’s Center for Documentary Studies, on a public art initiative that celebrates local traditions and stories.

“Face Up: Telling Stories of Community Life” captured the work of installing 14 public murals on exterior walls throughout Durham, including five Pauli Murray murals between 2007-09 with participation from 1,500 people. Webb-Bledsoe and Lau are working to organize all their documents and media from that project for Duke University Archives.

Eliza Mathew, Mayme Webb-Bledsoe and Jesse Huddleston pose in an office with a window view behind them.
From left to right, Eliza Mathew, Mayme Webb-Bledsoe and Jesse Huddleston work together in Duke Community Affairs. Photo by Travis Stanley

“Mayme has been that kind of leader, that kind of role model, that kind of quiet, powerful person who could bring a lot of strands of needs and resources and desires together to make things happen,” Lau said.

Webb-Bledsoe said her retirement will offer time to visit her daughter in Chicago, rest and “take a few steps back and reflect.”

But she doubts her work bettering Durham is done.

“I thrive off knowing that we can come together and watch people succeed in reaching what they want to achieve,” she said. “That has always been something that has fueled me and I think it will continue.”

Pastor Davis, for one, is hoping that’s the case.

“I don’t know if there’s anyone who can take her place,” he said.

Learn more about Mayme Webb-Bledsoe in our story, Durham Born, Duke and Durham Proud.

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