“Image Ownership: Robm154 (CC BY-SA 3.0)” Rock Rest was a resort near Kittery Point, Maine, that was open to African Americans during much of the 20th Century. Clayton Sinclair and his wife, Hazel, purchased a house on the small cape off Maine Route 103 in … Read MoreRock Rest (1938-1976)
Chowan Beach was an African American playground founded in 1926 when Eli Reid of Winton, in Hertford County, North Carolina, converted an abandoned fishing beach along the Chowan River into a family-oriented resort for African Americans. The area was originally settled in the Colonial era … Read MoreChowan Beach, Hertford County, North Carolina (1926-2004)
Freeman Beach, near Wilmington, North Carolina, was one of two North Carolina beaches available to African Americans in the state during the Jim Crow era. The beach area, originally 99 acres of underdeveloped beachfront land near Myrtle Grove Sound, was acquired by Alexander and Charity … Read MoreFreeman Beach-Seabreeze, Wilmington, North Carolina (ca. 1885- )
Buckroe Beach is one of the oldest recreational regions in Virginia. In 1619, the “Buck Roe” plantation was designated for public use for the newly arrived English settlers sent by the Virginia Company of London. By 1637, however, the plantation was converted into a commercial … Read MoreBuckroe Beach, Hampton, Virginia (1890- )
Located on the long stretch of the Atlantic City, New Jersey, shoreline just south of downtown, Chicken Bone Beach was designated as the exclusively African American section of beach around 1900. It remained a blacks only beach until the 1964 Civil Rights Act was passed. … Read MoreChicken Bone Beach, Atlantic City, New Jersey (1900- )
Woodland Park, Michigan was a small resort established by Marion E. Auther, a black Ohio businessman and leading salesman for the Idlewild Resort Company, the same company that developed the much more famous Idlewild resort. Woodland Park began when the Brookings Lumber Company sold the … Read MoreWoodland Park, Michigan (1921- )
American Beach, the only beach in Florida that welcomed black Americans and offered safe, secure overnight accommodations during Jim Crow segregation, was founded in 1935 by the Afro-American Life Insurance Company (AALIC) which was established in 1901 to provide the Jacksonville, Florida black community with … Read MoreAmerican Beach, Jacksonville, Florida (1936- )
Fox Lake, near Angola, Indiana, is a thriving resort community for African Americans. Fox Lake took its name from its original owner Daniel Fox, who first claimed the land around the lake during the initial years of settlement of the region. He established his land … Read MoreFox Lake, Angola, Indiana (1927- )
Highland Beach, Maryland, the oldest of the major black resort towns, was founded along the western shore of Chesapeake Bay in 1893 by Charles and Laura Douglass. Charles Douglass was the son of prominent abolitionist and nineteenth-century civil rights activist Frederick Douglass. Major Charles Douglass, … Read MoreHighland Beach, Maryland (1893- )
Idlewild, Michigan, was one of the leading African American resorts in the era of Jim Crow segregation. White land developers marketed Idlewild as an all-Negro resort town in Lake County, Michigan, about 300 miles northwest of Chicago, Illinois and 250 miles north of Detroit, through … Read MoreIdlewild, Michigan (1912- )
