By Yolanda Young and Thomas Bowen
Black Diary 1887, the revolutionary, GPS-enabled mobile app reimagining cultural tourism through a Black lens, is officially launching its Washington, D.C. edition.
Originally launched in Paris, with nearly 1,000 entries featuring people, places and events, Black Diary 1887 is now available in 30 U.S. cities, with the D.C. edition offering users immersive self-guided tours through neighborhoods like Shaw, Columbia Heights, Bloomingdale and Anacostia. The app highlights Go-Go music sites, African embassies, Black-owned businesses, historic landmarks and spaces of cultural resistance and celebration—rooted in the stories of the African Diaspora.
“Too often, Black cultural contributions are overlooked or fragmented. Black Diary 1887 brings those narratives together into one rich, accessible platform,” says founder Yolanda Young, a D.C. -based journalist, lawyer and activist.
Black Diary 1887 is completely free to download and use, and the company hopes to sustain this accessibility through a combination of sponsorships and a “pay what you can” model—ensuring the app remains open and inclusive for all users.
The origin story: From Paris to D.C.
In 2019, Young traveled to Paris and joined a “Black Paris” walking tour. Though inspired by the content, she found the format costly, inflexible and too limited for the rich history she knew was out there. As Toni Morrison famously said, “If there’s a book you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.”
Over the course of four years, Yolanda Young meticulously gathered research and spent another six months collaborating with developers to transform what began as an audio picture book into a fully interactive mobile app. During her research, she uncovered that Frederick Douglass had kept a travel diary while in Paris in 1887—a discovery that inspired the app’s name, Black Diary 1887. When launched on Kickstarter, the project quickly resonated with supporters, reaching its $10,000 funding goal in just 10 days—an achievement that outpaces 65 percent of all campaigns and signals a powerful public appetite for inclusive, tech-forward explorations of culture and history.
Black Diary 1887 is proud to announce Thomas Bowen as a Founding Partner. A respected leader in faith and public engagement and a seasoned cultural strategist, Bowen served as a senior advisor in President Biden’s White House and in top roles under D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser. His involvement underscores the project’s commitment to cultural depth, community impact and historical truth.
From the Parisian café Les Deux Magots, where a broke but brilliant James Baldwin once debated Richard Wright, to D.C.’s U Street Corridor pulsing with Go-Go rhythms, Black Diary 1887 connects the global Black experience across time and space.
Why it matters: The heartbeat of the culture
The app celebrates not just major events and icons, but also the everyday pulse of Black life. There are special walking routes that pay homage to:
- The Black Press — once the sole recorder of Black life, thought and resistance.
- The Black Church — the spiritual and social epicenter around which communities revolved and evolved.
- Everyday Icons — entrepreneurs, educators, musicians and local legends who shaped D.C.’s cultural identity.
Black Diary 1887 also features live “Around Me” GPS-maps with color-coded points of interest (e.g., purple for restaurants, gold for nightspots), and soon, will host in-person pop-up events like jazz concerts and literary salons.