TEL
Jim Crow Era
by Rick de Yampert
“
Carry your Green Book with you – You may need it.” So proclaimed the cover of the 1949 edition of the“ Negro Motorist Green Book – An International Travel Guide.”
The brainchild of Victor Hugo Green, a Black postal worker in New York City, the Green Book was published annually from 1936 to 1966. With more Black people moving into the middle class and buying cars, Green realized Black tourists, entertainers and businesspeople traveling across the U. S. needed information. It was the era of legalized Jim Crow segregation and discrimination, and Black travelers needed to know what hotels, restaurants, drugstores,“ tourist homes” and other businesses would welcome them and not refuse them service.
Also, given the threat of racist violence, especially in the South, Green realized Black travelers might unwittingly venture into life-anddeath situations – Blacks needed to know what areas and businesses provided some measure of sanctuary beyond mere service.
In the 1949 Green Book, only one such business of any kind was listed for Orlando, Florida: the Wells’ Built Hotel( listed as“ Wells Bilt” in the guidebook).
Dr. William Monroe Wells, a prominent Black physician, secured a building permit in 1926 and, unable to procure a loan, he self-funded the construction of the Wells’ Built Hotel. The venue opened in 1929 at 511 West South Street in Orlando’ s Parramore neighborhood, which had been established in the 1880s as a segregated Black community. Adjacent to his hotel, Wells also built the South Street Casino, which hosted entertainment and community events( contrary to a casino’ s association with gambling today).
The hotel ceased operations in the late 1950s due to the death of Dr. Wells and the advent of desegregation, and the South Street Casino was destroyed by fire in 1987. In 2001, the hotel building was renovated by the Association to Preserve African American Society, History and Tradition( PAST), a nonprofit organization that transformed the venue into the Wells’ Built Museum of African American History and Culture.
“ Dr. Wells saw a need and set about to fill that need,” said Elizabeth Grace, who from 2017 to 2020 served as executive director ‣ Elizabeth R. Grace
Photo credit: Ebyabe, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons VOLUME II 2025 | 11 |