DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. MEMORIAL GARDENS 1500 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd, Raleigh | bit.ly/mlk_gardens
The Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Gardens, built in 1989, was the first public park in the U.S. built to honor Dr. King and the Civil Rights Movement. Its centerpiece is a life-sized sculpture of Dr. King and a 12-ton granite water monument. Hayti Heritage Center
HAYTI HERITAGE CENTER 804 Old Fayetteville Street, Durham 919-683-1709 | hayti.org
By the 1950s, Durham developed a thriving black business district. “Parrish Street became known as the Black Wall Street,” Angela says. “It was also home of the Hayti community.” The Hayti Heritage Center, opened in 1975 in the former St. Joseph’s AME Church, is the only original building from that time. It now serves as an educational and cultural enrichment center presenting events, activities and programs supporting African American heritage.
GREEN BOOK EXHIBITS BEGIN TOUR
ESTEY HALL AT SHAW UNIVERSITY 118 E. South St., Raleigh 919-546-8200 | bit.ly/estey-hall
Raleigh’s Shaw University is the birthplace of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Ella Baker, a 1927 graduate of Shaw University and a close friend of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., helped organize the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. She later returned to Raleigh to help young blacks become more involved in the Civil Rights Movement. She was a driving force from the first SNCC meeting in 1960 at Shaw for the group that would become known for Freedom Rides and black voter registration drives in the South. FEBRUARY ONE MONUMENT Greensboro Convention and Visitors Bureau
Next month, two identical traveling exhibitions will highlight three decades of North Carolina African American history. “’Green Books’ Oasis Spaces: African American Travel in North Carolina, 1936-66”, will spend six weeks in two cities before continuing its journey across the state. On March 6, it will open at the International Civil Rights Center & Museum in Greensboro. The following week, on March 14, the second exhibition begins at the Hayti Heritage Center in Durham. “Extensive research for this project began several years ago and we are proud to share these exhibits with the public,” says Angela Thorpe, director of the North Carolina African American Heritage Commission, which is leading the multi-year project and exhibits. “Thanks to a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences, we have been able to document more than 300 Green Book sites in our state and begin to tell this story.” “The Negro Motorist Green Book” was published from 1936–1966 to help African Americans safely move through “oasis spaces” as they visited family, vacationed, conducted business and followed job opportunities during the early to middle part of the 20th century. Visit aahc.nc.gov/green-book-project to learn more, including future tour dates.
Estey Hall
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Gardens
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1601 E. Market St., Greensboro 336-334-7500
On the campus of North Carolina A&T University, formerly the Agricultural & Technical College of North Carolina, The February One Monument stands at the university’s Dudley Building. It features the four men who staged the original sit-in at the nearby Woolworth’s. It’s more than 15 feet tall and was dedicated on February 1, 2002. Pamela A. Keene is a freelance journalist who writes for magazines and newspapers across the Southeast and nationally.
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