While in college I was a history minor only because I considered being a history major. Thus I had enough credits to qualify as a minor so while reviewing the book Dining While Black, I stumbled upon a little bit of African American history which stimulated my curiosity. In the book, the author mentions The Negro Motorist Green Book . As African Americans took part of the American car culture, they were restricted by racial segregation in the United States. State laws in the South required separate facilities for African Americans. In 1936 Victor H. Green collected information on hotels, restaurants and gas stations that would do business with African Americans for his first edition of The Negro Motorist Green Book. It's purpose makes perfect sense to me though I have never heard of it. I am young enough that it was not applicable to my life but it saddens me to think something as valuable as the knowledge of this book's existence is not orally preserved in our history and I have to thank God that Aisha Karefa-Smart wrote about it.
I quickly googled the title and surely Wikipedia has a write up about it. It goes on to say Green started work as a postal carrier in Harlem, New York. In the 1930s, he began to collect information on stores in the New York area that accepted black travelers, and published his first guide in 1936. It was so popular that he immediately began to expand its coverage the next year to other US destinations. After retiring from the Postal Service, Green continued to work on updating issues of The Green Book, and building up the related travel business he had established in 1947.
He created a publishing office in Harlem. In 1947 he established a Vacation Reservation Service to book reservations at black owned establishments. By 1949 the guide included destinations in Bermuda, Mexico and Canada and listed food, lodging, and gas stations.[6] In 1952 Green changed the name to The Negro Travelers' Green Book. His travel bureau operated at offices at 200. W. 135th Street in Harlem, New York.
