Gainsboro Library
Opened in 1942, the Gainsboro Branch of the Roanoke City Public Library provided Roanoke’s African American residents a facility where children and adults could pursue self education. Designed by Eubank […]
Harrison School
Completed in 1917, Harrison School in the city of Roanoke is a monument to the pioneering efforts of Lucy Addison (1861-1937) to offer public academic secondary instruction to all children […]
Virginia Union University
The history of Virginia Union University exemplifies the efforts to bring higher education to southern Blacks following the Civil War. Because literacy among formerly enslaved individuals was often limited to […]
Maggie L. Walker National Historic Site (Maggie Walker House)
Maggie Lena Mitchell Walker (1867-1934), daughter of a former slave, rose by her work with a black fraternal order to become the first American woman to establish and head a […]
Third Street Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church
A landmark of the Jackson Ward Historic District, Third Street Bethel A.M.E. Church was built ca. 1857 to house one of Virginia’s first congregations to join the African Methodist Episcopal […]
Sixth Mount Zion Baptist Church
The Rev. John Jasper, born a slave in Fluvanna County on July 4, 1812, organized the Sixth Mount Zion Baptist Church congregation in 1867 in a former Confederate stable on […]
St. Luke Building
The St. Luke Building was erected as the national headquarters of the Independent Order of St. Luke, a black benevolent society founded after the Civil War to provide guidance and […]
First African Baptist Church
Built in 1876, the First African Baptist Church housed the mother congregation of Richmond’s black Baptists until its members moved to a new location in 1955. It stands on the […]
Morson’s Row
The three bow-fronted Italianate town houses forming Morson’s Row were erected as rental properties in 1853 by James Marion Morson, and are the last vestige of the former residential character […]
Jackson Ward Historic District
Richmond at the turn of the 20th century had one of the nation’s most thriving Black business communities. The hub of this activity was Jackson Ward with its fraternal organizations, […]