Highlights Green Book, restrictions, accommodations amid Jim Crow
CAPE MAY — A new exhibit explores how Black travelers used the “Green Book” and other publications during the Jim Crow Era to find friendly accommodations in the United States.
Its walls lined with little-known history, the “Routes of Black Travel: ‘The Green Book’ in Cape May and Wildwood” opened with a ceremony on Martin Luther King Jr. Day in the Carroll Gallery at the Emlen Physick Estate.
The exhibit, presented by Cape May MAC in association with Center for Community Arts (CCA), highlights methods of travel for vacation or business to Wildwood and Cape May.
“We started on this journey last year when we realized Cape May had restaurants and accommodations in the ‘Green Book,’” exhibit team member Mary Stewart said. “We’ve added that information to some of the trolley tours, which expands the scope of our storytelling and gives a more dimensional view of Cape May.”
“The Negro Motorist Green Book,” later renamed “The Negro Travelers’ Green Book,” was an annual guidebook first published in 1936 that provided African-American travelers essential information about safe places to stay, dine and obtain services while traveling in the segregated U.S.
“Many people have no idea this history even exists,” local historian Jeffrey Hebron said. “People assume that Black people were only housekeepers and servants, with no knowledge they were business owners too.”
Jim Crow laws forced racial segregation and were enforced harshly, often with violence. The laws lasted nearly 100 years until the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. The “Green Book” and similar publications helped keep Black travelers stay safe during this time and provided them some measure of freedom of movement.
Esso gas stations created safe havens for Black motorists to fill their tanks, and hotels such as the Banneker House, the Hotel Dale and Richardson’s Hotel, among others in Cape May, along with guest houses in Wildwood, gave Black visitors safe spaces to relax at the seaside.
Some of the establishments noted in the exhibit are clearly recognizable. John T. Nash was born in 1917 at 818 Jefferson St., on the corner of Dale Place, and later lived with his family in the brick house there.
When he returned to Cape May after serving in World War II, he and his wife, Janet (“Dolly”), bought the land previously occupied by the central hotel and built a motel.
They called it The Planter after the Confederate ship confiscated by Janet Nash’s famous ancestor and war hero, Robert Smalls. They sold the motel in 1979. Today it is The Boarding House, operated by the Hirsch family.
“The location has so much history, and we’re thankful they put this together to help us tell that story,” Jonathon Hirsch said.
“Isn’t it amazing how much we don’t know about a town we’ve lived in for years?” Stewart said.
The exhibit is open through March 23 in the Carroll Gallery on the grounds of the Physick Estate, 1048 Washington St. Admission is free.
– STORY and PHOTOS By JOHN COOKE/For the Sentinel