…turn of the 20th century. Fortunately, a number of scholars have documented the community that came to be known as Little Africa. James Weldon Johnson’s Black Manhattan In the Greenwich…
Read More…the name of Little Africa, the neighborhood that was centered around Minetta Lane was a key part of African American life in Manhattan up to the first decade of the…
Read More…attitudes, the integrated residential areas of Little Africa were a rare place where interracial families could settle (2016, Pgs. 16-17).” The neighborhood has changed and many remnants of Little Africa’s…
Read More…St. Benedict the Moor opened, the South Village was known as Little Africa, and was home to New York City’s largest Black population. The community was centered around Minetta Street and…
Read More…had been absorbed into the public school system. Playbill from the African Grove Theatre (1821); via NYPL 4. The First Known Black Theater Troup, the African Grove Theater The African Grove…
Read More…abolitionist made an impact internationally, reverberating far beyond the Greenwich Village neighborhood from which he emerged. To learn more about Little Africa, the African Free School, the African Grove Theatre,…
Read More…just on the edge of what was then known as “Little Africa,” the largest African American community in New York centered around today’s Minetta Street and Lane, and was just…
Read More…Village designation report entitled “Little Africa.” The South Village’s “Little Africa” community was the largest African-American settlement in New York throughout much of the 19th century, and lasted through the…
Read More…Rights and Social Justice Map. Want to learn about more civil rights and social justice sites in our neighborhoods? Check out our map. Sources: https://www.nyhistory.org/web/africanfreeschool/history/ https://www.nyhistory.org/web/africanfreeschool/history/philosophy.html http://cdm16694.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p15052coll5/id/31512 http://www.aaregistry.org/historic_events/view/african-free-school-opens-new-york-city https://www.jstor.org/stable/274931?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents http://maap.columbia.edu/place/9…
Read More…of free and enslaved Black people. Many free Black people lived along the no longer extant Minetta Creek, in an area that came to be known as “Little Africa.” This…
Read More…“Little Africa.” Within this dynamic community and serving the local population were churches, bars, and for a period from 1821-1823 (1826 according to some records), a theater known as the African Grove…
Read More…the first non-native settlers of the area, and in the mid-to-late 19th century its “Little Africa” community was the largest African American community in the city. But finding evidence of…
Read More…mid-19th century and known as “Little Africa.” The newly designated Sullivan-Thompson Historic District included part of “Little Africa,” and in looking at the recently published designation report for the Sullivan-Thompson…
Read More…African-American colleges and African American studies (DuBois himself would teach the very first course in African American history just feet from here at The New School in 1948). DuBois reported…
Read More…area, known for many years as “Little Africa” is located near the present-day intersection of 6th Avenue and Bleecker Street. Joyce has been researching this area and gathering historic images,…
Read More…written by Andrew Dolkart, contains extensive information about the African-American history of the South Village here and here. Read more about “Little Africa” here. Read the New York City landmark…
Read More…as by the mid-to-late 19th century, Greenwich Village was home to the “Little Africa” neighborhood, the largest African American community in New York and the center of African American life in…
Read More…as the Spring Street Presbyterian Churhc; theaters such as William Brown’s African Grove Theatre, an African-American owned and operated theater that presented productions with an African-American cast; and schools such…
Read More…national headquarters of the African Civilization Society and the Howard Colored Orphan Asylum. Weeksville also was home to some extraordinary African-American leaders. Susan Smith McKinney Steward was the first African-American…
Read More…deadly 1863 Draft Riots. Our Greenwich Village Historic District Map + Tours offers an African American tour with 25 sites in the Greenwich Village Historic District connected to significant African…
Read More…in the history of the United States. After the riots, approximately one-fifth of New York’s African American population left the city. Explore this and other key moments of African American…
Read MoreThe Little Free Library located on the Stuyvesant Oval in the Stuytown / Peter Cooper Village Complex. Photo Courtesy of Stuytown. Have you ever seen these little boxes when you’re…
Read More…as a licensed doctor; Henry Highland Garnet, a leading abolitionist and the first African American to address Congress; Ira Aldridge, the most famous African American actor of his era; Mathematician,…
Read More…slows, residents move on or assimilate deeper into American culture, and the ethnic identity of the neighborhood fades away. The Lower West Side (also called Little Syria), Little Africa, and…
Read More…C. Floyd to support African American culture. Kenkeleba began its work on The Bowery near Delancey Street with experimental projects to assist African American, Caribbean, and African artists in developing…
Read MoreThis February is African American History Month, a time to highlight and celebrate the rich history of African American struggle, success, and life in our neighborhoods over the last four…
Read More…records), a theater known as the African Grove Theater. The African Grove Theater was founded by William Alexander Brown, a free African American and pioneering actor and playwright. Through his…
Read More…community in Brooklyn at around the same time that Greenwich Village was home to Little Africa, New York’s largest African-American community. Many residents and leaders moved between the two communities,…
Read More…African Americans in general and African-American actors in particular. In the late 1950s he co-organized with Godfrey Cambridge and Maya Angelou fundraisers for Martin Luther King, Jr. at the Village…
Read More…predominantly African American in the 19th century and known to be home to many African American musicians. It is a coincidence that Gay Street is located just one block from…
Read More…built in 1905 and 1907, around the time many traces of Little Africa disappeared from the area. Little Africa lives on, instead, in the Abyssinian church, and other historically black…
Read MoreElisabeth Irwin founded Little Red School House in 1921. Image via LREI. In 2012, GVSHP spotlighted the work of Little Red School House/Elisabeth Irwin High School on Off the Grid…
Read More…courtesy of NYPL Digital Collections. The Crisis placed a special emphasis upon education, promoting the rise of African-American colleges and African American studies. Du Bois and The Crisis also had a notable…
Read More…to some remarkably consequential events, places, and figures in African-American history. To help explore just some of them, we have created a new African American History Guided Tour on our…
Read More…heart of a growing African American community in what was then referred to as “Little Africa”. Before becoming home to the Bethel AME, the site was purchased for the Associated…
Read More…Bennett. Bennett was one of the last residents of a Greenwich Village community known as “Little Africa,” a predominantly African-American section of the neighborhood which was, for much of New…
Read More…But from the 1700’s through the 19th century, the Village was the center of African-American life in New York, with what was referred to as “Little Africa” centered around present-day…
Read More…look at the East Village’s own historic Little Italy, centered around First Avenue near the beloved pastry shop and cafe. While not nearly as famous or intact as similar districts…
Read More…55 Little West 12th Street. Now home to the Brass Monkey, a popular restaurant and bar, the two little buildings sit by themselves. Looming in the background is the soaring…
Read More…and American rule, and its eventual abolition; how voting rights and other civil rights evolved and were won by and for African Americans in our city; the flowering of African…
Read More…the former home of Leontyne Price Ms. Price was one of the first internationally recognized African-American opera stars. Her career broke through racial barriers at a time when the United…
Read More…of “Little Africa,” 1925; photo via NYPL While far from a household name, nearly every American knows the results of Bennett’s efforts – it was he who spearheaded the successful drive…
Read More…Little Missionary’s Day Nursery since 1901 Sara Curry (c. 1863-1940) was known locally as The Little Missionary due to both her diminutive stature and her work with the impoverished families…
Read More…a center of German life known as Kleindeutschland, or Little Germany. For a time, it was the largest German-speaking community beyond Berlin and Vienna, and provided for residents numerous houses…
Read MoreJune is named African-American Music Appreciation Month. But insofar as it is hard to conceive of genres of American music that have not been fundamentally shaped or originated by Black…
Read More…search of a better life as so many other southern African Americans did during the first wave of the Great Migration, and it’s with Harlem that Bearden is most closely…
Read More…African American citizens, and a crusader for abolition, equality, and voting rights for African Americans. Mayor de Blasio refused to support landmark designation of the site. With the building having…
Read More…Illustrated Newspaper.” Source: Library of Congress In 1867, Rebecca J. Cole became only the second African American woman to receive a medical degree in the United States. (Another Rebecca, Rebecca…
Read More…some authentic red sauce or cannolis. But another part of the East Village’s mouth-watering culinary heritage is its own Little India– a block of 6th Street between 1st and 2nd…
Read More…landed in our neighborhood is the focus of our attention today — Ukrainians! To explore some of the Ukrainian sites in the neighborhood, we’re sharing this East Village Little Ukraine…
Read More…built in 1881 by Joseph J. Little (1841-1913) of 4 Van Nest Place (today’s 57 Charles Street) in Greenwich Village. Little had an impressive and varied career, including as a…
Read More…gave up the ghost and sold their little piece of land to Village Cigars in 1938, merging the two plots. While the rebellious little mosaic remains, its message of individual…
Read More…also serves as an obvious reminder that a site is historically significant. For African American History month, we’re taking a look at a number of historic plaques we’ve placed throughout…
Read More…and still do — as Little Ukraine. Like many immigrant groups, the first wave of Ukrainian immigration into the United States consisted of individuals flocking to economic opportunity in the…
Read More…school, served as the first chaplain of the New York African Society for Mutual Relief and a vice-president of the African Bible Society, and supported the establishment of Freedom’s Journal,…
Read More…the 19th century as Little Africa due to its sizeable African American population. Proposed in Congress on February 26, 1869, the ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment was nearly a year-long…
Read More…Rights & Social Justice Map, which has more than twenty sites connected to African-American history and civil rights; click here to see them all. One such little-known but incredibly important…
Read More…the neighborhood’s past as Kleindeutschland, or “Little Germany.” On this noteworthy anniversary, we thought we’d survey and translate some of them. Ottendorfer Library & Stuyvesant Polyclinic Ottendorfer Library-German Dispensary. The…
Read More…1868 and has long operated in the transitional style row house at 239 West 14th Street. It’s one of the last vestiges of the cultural district formerly known as “Little…
Read More…owned by a single family, the Stuyvesants. Today there only remains a single remanent of that family estate, a quirky little street with their name: Stuyvesant Street. 1868 Insurance Map…
Read More…19th and early 20th century. Kleine Deutschland, or “Little Germany” at one point boasted one of the largest German-speaking communities in the world and many manifestations of that era remain…
Read More…for an African-American audience and for African-American children, and what would become the American Civil Liberties Union, among many other entities. Following a campaign led by Village Preservation, the building…
Read More…especially LGBTQ people of color, could be stopped by the police or arrested for very little or nothing at all. In the 1950s and 1960s, police were especially violent when…
Read More…neighborhood, particularly during the 1930s and 1940s, to escape war in Europe and fascism in Spain. Rob talked about the community that gave this area its nickname, “Little Spain,” and…
Read More…is one area in which there is a “they,” however, and that is for construction and art installation on city-owned land and in city-owned buildings. A little-known city agency, the…
Read More…All were demolished to make way for the building that we have today fronting both Broadway and Lafayette Street, and thus a little piece of London, France, and Greece disappeared…
Read More…19th century, the Village was the center of African-American life in New York, with what was referred to as “Little Africa” centered around present-day Minetta, Thompson, Cornelia and Gay Streets…
Read MoreNYU recently sent around a notice about this year’s NYU and Community Board #2 Children’s Halloween Parade. According to NYU, they want “YOU to help!” design an image for this…
Read MoreSt. George’s Ukrainian Catholic Church. Image from GVSHP It seems that you can’t look at the news these days without seeing something about Ukraine. From the protests in Kiev, to…
Read MoreEarlier this year, we were gifted with a truly extraordinary set of photographs from a photographer and longtime East Villager. There’s still some work to be done before we can…
Read More“A long time ago in the 1960s, a young white girl from Ohio committed herself to being a revolutionary,” begins a short feature documentary about Patti Astor and her FUN…
Read More…found in the East Village and NoHo, starting with a theater group in the early 19th century. African Grove Theater The African Grove Theater was the first known black theater…
Read More…in Village history when a robust African-American neighborhood, called “Little Africa,” was centered around Minetta Street and Lane and surrounding blocks. Garnet, deeply rooted in both her Brooklyn and Village communities,…
Read More…the time, the heart of the city’s largest black community was in Greenwich Village, and the area around Minetta Lane, Minetta Street, and Minetta Place was known as Little Africa….
Read More…worked hard to fight for himself and the African-American community, eventually becoming the first African-American to address the United States House of Representatives. He also at one time resided at…
Read More…known as “Little Africa” — a predominantly African-American section of Greenwich Village centered around Minetta Street and Lane, Gay Street, and Thompson Street — still existed but was rapidly disappearing…
Read More…first black Catholic church in the North, located in what was then the heart of New York’s African American community, Greenwich Village’s ‘Little Africa.’ This African American parish’s taking over…
Read More…by the rampaging mobs. The owners of the home provided refuge in their basement. The house was located just on the edge of what was then known as “Little Africa,”…
Read More…organization advocating tot the civil rights of African Americans in the United States. During the first decade of the 20th Century, the rate of lynchings of African Americans, particularly men,…
Read MoreFreedman’s Bank in Little Africa as shown in the GVSHP Civil Rights and Social Justice Map. On March 3, 1865, The Freedman’s Savings and Trust Company, commonly referred to as…
Read More…north to urban areas following Emancipation and the conclusion of the Civil War. Check out this past Off the Grid blog post for more information about the Little Africa community…
Read More…Gay Street, long known for its African American residents, and “Little Africa,” which was centered around nearby Minetta Street and Minetta Lane. Like many African-Americans living in the Village at…
Read More…of Africa. Weston played an important role in advancing the argument, now widely accepted, that the roots of jazz trace back to African music. Weston’s music prominently incorporated African elements…
Read More…city’s African American community, who advocated for abolition and suffrage in and beyond the Village. One was the first African American to address the U.S. House of Representatives, and the…
Read More…into the first years of the 20th, the area around Minetta Lane, Minetta Street, and Minetta Place was referred to as “Little Africa.” Shiloh operated out of the Sixth Avenue…
Read More…as “Little Africa,” the largest African-American community in New York. By the 1920s, however, most of Little Africa’s residents had been pushed out or moved Uptown (the extension of Sixth…
Read MoreAfrican Landholdings in New Amsterdam According to historian Christopher Moore, the first legally emancipated community of people of African descent in North America was found in Lower Manhattan, comprising much…
Read More…now lie in the crypt of the Mother African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church in Harlem. The current church- Mother African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, also known as “Mother Zion”, located…
Read MoreThe Shiloh Presbyterian Church is one of many African American churches once found in Greenwich Village, when nearly all the city’s leading African American churches were located in this neighborhood….
Read More…9th Avenue and 14th Street in Meatpacking District. Little Flatiron Built in 1849 and often referred to as “the Little Flatiron Building,” it pre-dates its better known cousin, completed in…
Read More…using African spices injected with an Asian flair. Because Africa is a vast place and African food so diverse (and all the more if you include the diaspora), the menu…
Read More…most popular compositions include “Hi-Fly,” “Little Niles,” and “Blue Moses.” Weston was also a key political figure in global civil rights activism. As African countries fought for freedom from colonial…
Read More…farms in Manhattan in the Stokes’ book as well as the information in Moore’s book, we were able to map out the location of each African landholder. African landholdings in…
Read More…past Off the Grid posts: A Civil Rights Activist and the Café Society The 1863 Draft Riots and Abigail Hopper Gibbons Little Africa: Tracing African Americans in the South Village…
Read More…was once home to “Little Africa,” New York’s largest African-American community), to its Italian-American immigrant history, to its artistic and bohemian history. But this designation report also broke new ground…
Read More…African-American neighborhood, called “Little Africa,” which was centered around the area of Minetta. Tish and Fonny make the decision to to turn their lifelong friendship into romance one evening in…
Read More…a thriving free-black community known as “Little Africa” located near the Minetta Stream (now Minetta Lane), which is on the edge of Washington Square. Though impoverished, and with poor sanitary…
Read More…the South Village?,” here are just a few of the things: (l. to r.) St. Anthony of Paudua Church; “Little Africa” ca. 1900; ‘Eve’s Hangout’ lesbian bar on MacDougal Street,…
Read More1 Little West 12th Street Many people know the restaurant Bagatelle located at 1 Little West 12th Street for their lavish brunch parties, where as one recent brunch reviewer stated…
Read More…African American figures, from some of the first black churches in New York to the home of author Richard Wright: Our South of Union Square Map contains an African American history tour with nearly…
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