Did you know that North America’s first free Black settlement was located in Greenwich Village, the East Village, and NoHo in the 17th century? That the center of Black life in 19th-century New York was the South Village? And that in the 20th century, leading Black civil rights organizations and cultural hotspots were concentrated in Greenwich Village, while many of our city’s greatest jazz musicians and venues were found in the East Village?

This February, we invite you to explore our neighborhoods’ rich African American history, and to join us in advocating to honor and protect significant historic sites, many of them endangered.

Preservation Successes

We fought for and won landmark designation of 70 Fifth Avenue, the former headquarters of the NAACP and The Crisis Magazine, and for 50 West 13th Street, home of leading 19th-century Black abolitionists, suffragists, and business leaders.

Preservation Battles Ongoing

We’re still fighting for landmark designation of our proposed South of Union Square Historic District, which was home to trailblazing Black political and civil rights organizations, studios where some of the greatest Black musicians of all time, from Billie Holiday to Jimi Hendrix, made history-changing recordings, where great Black musicians like Charles Mingus lived, where transformative works of Black literature like The Autobiography of Malcolm X were published, and more. Explore all this history here, and

TO HELP:

Explore History

Our expanded and redesigned Civil Rights and Social Justice Map highlights more than 200 sites in Greenwich Village, the East Village, and NoHo connected to important people, events, and movements in civil rights history, from the deadly 1863 Draft Riots to the founding of the NAACP to the killing of Michael Stewart.

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 American figures, from some of the first Black churches in New York to the home of author Richard Wright.

Our East Village Building Blocks website features an African American history tour with more than two dozen sites connected to prominent figures, locations, and groups in black history, from the home of Charlie “Bird” Parker to the site of the founding of the NYC Chapter of the Black Panthers.

Connect your school with our Children’s Education program’s incredibly popular Black History curriculum, available for middle and high school. It explores everything from the origins of slavery in New York and the struggles for emancipation and civil rights to the vibrant African American cultural movements of the 19th and 20th centuries and the social and cultural issues being debated today.

View more than a dozen videos from Village Preservation exploring and celebrating Black history, from plaque-unveiling ceremonies honoring Lorraine Hansberry, Alex Haley, James Baldwin, and Jean-Michel Basquiat, to tours of African American historic sites in our neighborhoods, to past programs about the Underground Railroad, Black Bohemia, the first Black theater in America, and the “Little Africa” neighborhood located in the heart of Greenwich Village.

Explore our historic plaques marking Black history in our neighborhoods, including the homes of Charles Mingus, Lorraine Hansberry, Alex Haley (video), Jean-Michel Basquiat (video), and the former NAACP headquarters and “Home of the Black Arts Movement” 27 Cooper Square (video).

Join us for our 2025 Black History Month programs, which include a members-only tour of the Whitney Museum’s “Edges of Ailey” exhibit (waitlist only); an exploration of the history of slavery and First Presbyterian Church; and a program about the first book published for Black children in this country a century ago in our neighborhood, and efforts to update it for today. 

New Oral History: Kevin McGruder and Greenwich Village’s Black LGBTQ+ Literary Circles

We’re pleased to share our 71st oral history with Prof. Kevin McGruder. A native of Toledo, Ohio, McGruder joined Harlem’s Abyssinian Baptist Church in 1987, and was among the founders of the Abyssinian Development Corporation. He also served as Assistant Church Clerk, and led the Archives and History Ministry for many years. A graduate of Columbia University, Harvard University, and CUNY, he has written extensively on Black and LGBTQ+ history. In the 1980s, McGruder was part of a cohort of Black gay men who came to Greenwich Village to find community and particularly to write and organize. In his oral history, McGruder shares the arc of his life and experiences, his time in Greenwich Village, and its role in Black gay life in the 1980s.

Village Preservation maintains scores of oral histories with figures who witnessed, participated in, or made significant history in our neighborhoods, including Jane Jacobs, Penny Arcade, Wolf Kahn, Jonas Mekas, Marlis Momber, Edwin Fancher, Margot Gayle, David Amram, Matt Umanov, Merce Cunningham, Joan Davidson, Richard Meier, Ralph Lee, Mimi Sheraton, John Guare, Calvin Trillin, and Chino Garcia. 

Extended through February: Celebrate the James Baldwin Centennial with Our Interactive Public Artwork