SECTION THREE
Hargett St: A Mecca For Blacks For Decades
Hi* African-American presence
in downtown Raleigh was commer
cial, as well as residential. Pew
African-Americans operated busi
nesses in postwar Raleigh, but the>
dominated selected ones. Hargett
Street was an example and a msecs
for entrepreneurs and shoppers.
Today Hargett Streetislined with
a few businesses and offices, park
ing lots, some vacant storefronts
and pedestrians, many of whom
work in the downtown area during
business hours Monday through
Friday.
But from the 1920s to the mid
1960s, East Hargett Street from
South Wilmington to South Blount
was the business and social center
for African-Americans in Raleigh
and Wake County.
Earlier, in 1891, all but two of the
22 barbers in downtown Raleigh
were Mack, and African-Americans
enjoyed a longtime monopoly in
running "eating houses” and huck
ster stalls. Their busineses also in
cluded boarding houses, meat and
Raleigh
The City
Of Oaks
In the year 1671 an itinerant
British preacher, who came to
America via Jamaica, Florida, and
the Chesapeake, noted in hie jour
nal, “Afterward*, it being upon me,
I traveled to Carolina and two
Friends accompanied me, it being
all Wildernetsee, and no English
inhabitants or Path-ways, but some
marked Tree# to guide People. The
first Day’s Journey we did pretty
well, and lay that Nightin the woods
as we often used to do in those
Parts.” note Parts, though they
remained a wilderness for another
60 years or so, were to become the
environs of North Carolina’s Capi
tal City.
Raleigh’s location, however, was
not born, like Athena, whole-macU
without adversity. By 1744 nearly
every promising community it
North Carolina was contending fa
the honor of the site. Among then
were Edenton, Halifax, New Bern
and not even a regional coalitior
could sway the majority in the as
semblies between 1744 and 1790;
When Wake Cross Roads or Walu
Court House, as the place was oftei
called, was considered, its detrac
tors argued that the capital ahoulc
not be “situate” in a lonely grove a
oaks, inland from any part, a plan
without populace, amid thorn an<
briar with nothing'to recommend it
but a courthouse, an inn, two oi
three scattered residences, the best
of which having only a plain gam
brsl roof. Further, it made no differ
enoe that this inn was on the stag)
road connecting Petersburg t<
Charleston. Hie high road also went
through other competing localities
Fayetteville for one; and as for Waki
Cross Roads being a “sentrical” loca
tion in the State, so, give or take t
few miles, was Smithfield.
Hie fight continued as the Gen
oral Assembly carried its recordi
tram town to town by oxcart, wagon
coach when a session was called
And when records did arrive, it wai
found that when the appointed da)
came for the meeting, there was not
a quorum of solans for processinf
legislation. Nor had all the docu
ments arrived intact. Exasperated
at this point, the Convention of 178(
decided that a permanent seat o
government must be settled upon
And on Dec/s, 1791, sitting in Nev
Bern, the representatives acted
upon the earlier decision. That re so
lution had not specified the capital’i
exact location except to admonisb
that ”... it shall be left to the discre
tion of the General Assembly tc
ascertain the exact spot, provided
always that it shall be within ter
miles of the plantation whereon
Isaac Hunter now resides, in th<
county of Wake.”
(See OAKS, P.2)
fish markets, and a variety of skilled
trades, such as shoemaking, black
smithing, and upholstering.
During the decade before Jim
Crow laws were enacted, these busi
nesses and others that African
Americans operated served both
races in Raleigh. Consequently,
they were located throughout the
heart of the business district. In
1886, for example, as the number of
downtown African-American enter
prises peaked in the 19th century,
19 were situated along Wilmington
Street, nine on Hargett Street, and
20 others were dispersed along
other streets that crisscrossed the
business district.
As the 19th century drew to a
close, Raleigh’s African-American
community reflected both antebel
lum and new, postwar characteris
tics.
On the one hand, numerout
blacks continued to live throughout
the city, often on the property of
former masters. Furthermore, as
before the war, many continued to
hold traditional 'Negro jobs” as
laborers, servants and barbers. In
1896, barely two percent of working
blacks were professionals. Most
blacks remained illiterate and vic
tims of disproportionately high
death and crime rates.
One of the major new develop
ments in the landscape of early
20th-century Raleigh was the emer
gence of the African-American busi
ness district. The “Negro Main
Street,” a place devoted to African
American oriented commerce, has
been an integral part of American
urban geography in this century.
Hargett Street, west of Moore
Square, was to become and remain
for decades this focal point.
Between 1900 and the mid-1920s,
the number of African-American
operated businesses on this street
soared from nine to 50, more than
twice the number of white establish
ments. Only two businesses run by
African-Americans remained on
other downtown streets.
The Arcade Hotel, built in 1921 at
120-122 E. Hargett St., was consid
ered the finest hotel for African
Americans between Florida and
New York in the days of segregated
accommodations.
Big-name entertainers such as
Duke Ellington, Cab Calloway and
Count Basie stayed there, whether
they were performing there or any
where else in eastern North Caro
lina.
The street became a center for
African-American business largely
because tum-of-the-century Jim
Crow laws prohibited African
Americans from using public facili
ties with whites.
Hargett Street, east from 137
Fayetteville, had barber shops, gro
cery and clothing stores, restau
rants, furniture stores, jewelry and
cigar stores, and various business
and professional offices.
The street also boasted the Mary
Ellen Tea Room and the Yellow Rose
Tea Room. Mechanics and Farmers
bank, built on East Hargett Street
in 1927, made it through the Great
Depression when many local banks
failed.
Down the street, at what is now
known as Moore Square and was
once called Baptist Grove, was an
other meeting place for African
Americans who just wanted to sit
and chat or eat lunch.
African-American businessmen
were “pushed” as well as “pulled”
onto Hargett Street. Although Jim
Crow laws did not legally restrict
African-Americans from operating
businesses elsewhere in the com
mercial district, white property
owners stopped leasing space to
African-American entrepreneurs,
and a growing number of whites
ceased patronizing African-Ameri
can establishments.
During this period whites began
seeking out white-operated enter
prises, many of which had been for
merly virtually monopolized by Af
rican-Americans. Barbershops
owned by African-Americans closed
up along Fayetteville and Wilming
ton streets, as they lost their trade
T
i
to white competitors.
Between 1900 and 1915, the pro
portion of Raleigh’s African-Ameri
can operated barbershops fell from
82 percent to 67 percent, and by
1925, only half of the barbershops
were run by African-Americans.
Blacks were “pulled” to East
Hargett Street for many reasons.
First, historically African-Ameri
cans had operated businesses and
institutions on this street. The Col
ored Odd Fellows Hall, for example,
had been located here since 1881.
Second, though East Hargett was
not one of the city’s premiere thor
oughfares, which were the first
choices of white merchants and
businessmen, it was readily acces
sible to these streets, and was itself
a main artery through the heart of
the city.
Third, African-American enter
prises in the Moore Square area of
East Hargett Street provided a
commercial link between African
American neighborhoods directly to
east and south, and to mqjor white
owned establishments to the west.
Finally, and perhaps most impor
tantly, as influential African
American entrepreneurs and pro
fessionals began occupying spares
on the street, others followed suit.
In 1911, black businessman C.E.
Li’ghtner opened a funeral parlor
and real estate office i n an “old sh op”
at 125 E. Hargett St. Soon other
black entrepreneurs, such as saloon
operator and restaurateur Charles
Hoover, opened businesses nearby.
Within little more than a decade,
the 100 block of East Hargett Street
was the focus of black commerce and
entertainment, symbolized by
Lightner’s new, three-story brick
“Arcade” that commanded the cen
ter of the block Lightner himself
would later sum up the commercial
importance and cultural vitality of
this area. “Every Negro who wanted
to go into business in Raleigh
wanted to be on East Hargett Street
because we had built it up,” In
stated. “Everybody who came to
Raleigh felt he hadn’t been to the
city until he had been to East
Hargett Street.”
Raleigh’s black commercial dis
trict was supported by a growing
African-American population. By
1920 there were more than 8,500
blacks in Raleigh, which had grown
to more than 24,000. The total popu
lation had risen from 13,643 at the
turn of the century, and reflected
the city’s emergence as a regional
(See HARGETT, P. 2)
Black Neiqhborhoods Reflect Traits
BY RICHARD MATTSON
The black neighborhoods of
Raleigh express in their geography
andarchitecture the development of
the African-American communities
in this Southern city. The changing
; patterns of distribution of blacks at
once reflect Raleigh’s particular
i physical and economic characteris
tics, while being typical of cities
throughout the region.
Similarly, the building types and
institutions in the black community
embody local and quite personal
, choices, tastes, and constraints, as
well as much broader cultural and
i regional traits. Hie setting, of
course, is a tumultuous and contro
versial one, including slaveiy and
Jim Crow, generationsof sedulously
defined legal and customary racial
segregation, and an unprecedented
“farm-to-factory" migration.
In North Carolina as in the entire
South, slaves and free blacks (some
referred to as "non-slave” blacks)
lived and labored in cities long be
fore the great Northern migration in
the 20th century. In 1860, blacks
comprised 20 percent to 40 percent
population in the typical Southern
dty. Usually, they were confined to
most menial and low-paying work—
“Negro Jobs” they came to be
called—such as unskilled mill and
railroad labor, domestic service; and
road gang employment.
However, through diligence, ap
prenticeships, and some luck, it was
possible for slaves to earn enough
money to buy their freedom, and for
free blacks to gain economic security
and, occasionally, even middle-class
status as enterprising barbers,
draymen, carpenters, brick masons,
stone cutters, and harness makers.
In Raleigh, slave Lunsford Lane,
for instance, purchased his freedom
as well as a house and town lot
working as a tobacco merchant,
janitor, and messenger. Yet, Lane’s
growing wealth and status also
made him enemies, and he was ef
fectively run out of Raleigh in 1841,
before he was able to buy the free
dom of his family and friends.
Neither slave nor completely free
(thus the term “non-slave”), free
blacks held a peculiar status in the
antebellum 8outh. They were “a
easts within a caste,” in the words of
John Hope Franklin. During the
early 19th century, as the fear of
slave insurrections mounted among
whites, Southern legislatures en
acted laws that intruded upon virtu
ally all aspects of free black life.
In the 1820s, and especially fol
lowing the Nat Turner uprising in
1831, the state of North Carolina
passed legislation that, among
other prohibitions, stripped free
blades of the right to vote, to preach,
carry firearms, marry whites or
slaves, and even to do business with
slaves. Moreover, a strong public
sentiment arose opposing the for
mal education of free blacks.
Against this backdrop of white
distrust and discrimination, black
residential areas developed in and
around antebellum Raleigh. A cen
sus conducted in 1807 recorded 33
free blacks, 270 slaves, and 423
whites living in the city’s three
wards. The most populous East
Ward contained the vast majority ol
free blacks (28), as well as 11 slaves
and 197 whites. To be sure, such
ward data fail to show the distribu
tion of the two races within each
ward; and one can only speculate
about the existence of black districts
outside the city's bounds. It is
thought that Oberlin had a black
community prior to the war.
However, the census suggests a
residential pattern that would be
come more and more distinct oveT
time; and one which was dcommon
to cities across the antebellum
South. While blacks were inter
spersed among whites across the
city, free blacks, in particular, also
tended to live in small enclaves re
flecting segregation along racial, as
well as ewconomic, lines.
This spatial arrangement would
become more fully developed in
Raleigh as the city grew in the early
19th century. By 1860 its population
had reached 4,780, including 466
free blacks and 1,621 slaves (44
percent of the total population).
These figures reflected the city’s
slow but steady commercial expan
sion, given impetus by the comple
tion of the Raleigh and Gaston Rail
road in 1840, the construction of a
second rail line (the North Carolina
Railroad) in 1864, and the rebuild
ing of the state Capitol between
1833 and 1840. Consequently, small
foundries, railroad repair shops,
and other assorted industries ap
peared around the tracks skirting
the fringe of the city, and the fledg
ling centra] business area assumed
a more sophisticated air. Raleigh’s
antebellum expansion was capped
by the annexation of 1857, which
extended the original grid by one
quarter mile in each direction. The
capital city was now a neat square
mile in size.
Enslaved blacks, according to
contemporary accounts of both
blacks and whites, lived across this
landscape, where 152 white families
owned them. They resided within
slaveholders’ houses—in separate
wings, basements and upper sto
ries—as well as in detached dwell
ings behind the main house.
For example, Charles N. Hunter,
a former slave of Raleigh’s William
Dallas Haywood, recounted living
with other slaves on the Haywood
family lot. Bertha Lane, as a slave
and domestic worker for Gov.
Charles Manly, occupied a two
story, three-room frame house on
his South Street property.
Reflecting upon his childhood in
antebellum Raleigh, John H. Win
der (who was white) described slave
qurters behind the J.H. Bryan home
on Blount Street. And, in his 1937
memoir, Judge Robert Watson
Winston wrote in a patronizing way
of ex-slaves who were so content
with their pre-war accommodations
in the masters’ residences, that they
“never left the premises and
scarcely knew that thehahd been set
(See NEIGHBORHOODS, P. 8)
The Carolinian
WEEK OF MARCH 26 - APRIL 2,1992
a