C W Thomas Park — Attraction in Dania Beach

In honor of Black History Month I would like to highlight Threads, an interactive transit tour map exploring Broward County's black history. The map can be filtered by city and landmark type. One of the landmarks on the map is CW Thomas Park in Dania Beach. The park is located in a historically Black section of Dania Beach known as Danie.

C.W. Thomas Park was formerly named Modello Park. The name was changed to honor Charlie Will Thomas who graduated from Attucks school, another historic landmark a few miles north. Attucks High School in Dania Beach was a high school for Black students that graduated its last class in 1968. It later became Attucks Middle School, a magnet school in Broward County Public Schools. C.W. Thomas was lauded for his philanthropy and community service.

The historic baseball diamonds in this park were home to the Dania Redbirds, a semi-pro negro league baseball team. The team was created in 1958 by local high school graduates from Attucks High School and included players from the Libera, now Hollywood, and Dania Beach neighborhoods As a teenager in the 70s, Oddibe McDowell played for the Redbirds. He went on to play professionally after being drafted in the first round by the Texas Rangers. After he retired from baseball he coached at his alma mater, McArthur High School in Hollywood. Another notable Redbird player was former Chicago Cubs Outfielder Andre Dawson known as the "The Hawk" and "Awesome Dawson."

Today the park is undergoing a transformation. It is just one of Dania Beach's parks benefitting from a 45 million dollar investment into the city parks and recreation department. Other parks receiving upgrades from this money include Chester Byrd Park, Frost Park, and PJ Meli Aquatic Complex. In addition a $3 million Federal Grant has been secured for the redevelopment of a recreational, social, and civic community center for C.W. Thomas Park. When completed park amenities will include a new football field, playground, community center, covered exercise area, basketball court, dog park, recreation pool, and parking lot. Groundbreaking took place back in October of 2022 and the park still isn't finished. Renovations are expected to be complete...

This was my voting spot for Nov 8th elections and I am not pleased. I prefer the city center (Dania Library) location. Google did not target the correct location within the park. Add to that a creep guy parked across three parking spots and staring across the street at the elementary kids playing during recess, was not a good vibe for voting. Inside a 15 year old is verifying voter information and drivers licenses and mumbling comments about the...

If you wanna your baby and kids get high smelling marijuana, go to this park, to nearest playground. Its unbelievable environment. Dania beach, its insane! do something. There are bunch of kids playing all sort of games, lots of babies and toddlers. Doesnt matter what time you’ll go there, there is always disgusting...