Starting in 1936, Victor Hugo Green, a letter carrier who lived in Manhattan, published the “Negro Motorist Green Book,” a listing of hotels, restaurants and other businesses where Blacks would be welcome and safe in the era of Jim Crow. The Green Book became enormously popular and was published until 1966.
(Courtesy Photo)
More than 80 years later, the South Carolina African American Heritage Commission has reintroduced the spirit of the original Green Book with the release of a free mobile travel guide app that highlights more than 300 cultural attractions, districts and markers within the state. The application uses geotags and interactive maps to show places located within 25 miles of a user’s location.
“This is one of the first statewide mobile travel guides to African-American cultural destinations to be produced by a state anywhere in the U.S.,” South Carolina Sen. Vincent Sheheen said in a statement. “It is positioned to increase even further the $2.4 billion annual economic impact of African-American tourism in our state.”
Floyd Abernathy, who offers low country and Gullah tours through his company UsTravel, told the AFRO that the recreation of the Green Book could not come at a better time for travelers and vacationers uneasy about racial bias. “We are in a time where we seem to be going back in time with race relations – especially with Black people traveling through unfamiliar, largely White spaces,” Abernathy said. “The history of ‘Sundown Towns,’ and open hostility towards outsiders is a reality even in 2017.” A Sundown Town was a location where Blacks were not welcome after the sun went down.
Abernathy notes an experience with three college students traveling to the Bayou Classic, a football game played between two Louisiana HBCUs in New Orleans, and pulling over to the side of the road to look at, take pictures with and pick a handful of cotton from a field bordering the road. They were arrested for trespassing and stealing that handful of cotton. “They learned that there are still rules to traveling in unfamiliar places and the Green Book – even as an app, means that you stay on course for fun, safety, and new experiences,” Abernathy said.