First published in 1936, the 'Negro Motorist Green Book' was a compilation of restaurants, over-night accommodations, gas stations and other public services for people of color traversing a “White-only” landscape for Black travelers during segregation. Jacksonville was a major Florida destination featured in the document. Here are four Green Book sites in Jacksonville that still stand today.

Background

Duke Ellington playing a game of in LaVilla while on tour in 1955. (Library of Congress)

“There will be a day sometime in the near future when this guide will not have to be published. That is when we as a race will have equal rights and privileges in the United States.” - Victor Green

First published in 1936 by Green, the “Negro Motorist Green Book” became the bible of Black travel during Jim Crow. For years, outside of the Black community, little was known about the Green Book, which was a compilation of accommodations, gas stations, restaurants and other businesses for people of color attempting to travel free of racial humiliation, discrimination and violence.

The majority of “Green Book” sites around the country have been destroyed already, making the preservation of the little that remains, more important than ever. Thanks to the New York Public Library’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, 21 issues of the Green Book, dating between 1937 to 1967 are digitized online. Of the Jacksonville sites, four remain standing. The Fiesta Hotel in Durkeeville, a former Odd Fellows Masonic Lodge building that housed the Sunrise Restaurant in the Black Bottom, and the Richmond and Wynn Hotels (listed as Hotel Sanders) in LaVilla.

Fiesta Motel

1251 Kings Road

The Fiesta Motel was a motel for Black travelers when it opened in 1961 with 26 air conditioned rooms, each with television and telephone. The old motel is now the 1251 Efficiency Apartments at 1251 Kings Road.

A 1968 postcard of the Fiesta Motel. (Library of Congress)

Hotel Sanders

636 West Ashley Street

Originally built across the street from 19th-century madam Cora Crane’s Hotel de Dream, this three story structure housed a variety of businesses during the ragtime, jazz and blues age of the early 20th century. In 1913, it housed a restaurant owned by M. Kinsey Bellamy. In 1931, the Wynn Hotel opened in the building’s upper floors, while a jazz club called the Lenape Tavern and Bar opened on the first floor.

Operated by Jack D. Wynn, the hotel became a favorite spot of Louis Armstrong when visiting LaVilla. Wynn’s son, Daniel Ruben Wynn, is a noted local artist who had his work exhibited at the Center of International Culture in Paris, France in 1975. In addition to Armstrong, others who performed at the Lenape include Dizzie Gillespie, Billie Holiday and Ray Charles, who briefly lived at 633 West Church Street. It was identified as Hotel Sanders in the Green Book.