May 12, 2017 Orange County Review
By the 1930s the automobile was well into production and the possibility of expanded travel from town to town, throughout the state, or even cross-country was becoming a reality.
However, the African American population found the desire to travel rife with complications.
In 1936, Victor H. Green launched an innovative plan to address a serious issue confronting a specific group of travelers in United States. The precursor to today’s AAA Travel Guide was specifically designed to benefit the racially disenfranchised. Published for 28 years, the book varied in its official title—“The Negro Motorist Green Book” and “The Negro Travelers’ Green Book”—but was always popularly and simply known as the “Green Book.”
In the 1949 edition, Wendell P. Alston, Special Representative, Esso Standard Oil Co. writes in an article entitled “The Green Book helps solve your travel problems:”
“For some travelers however, the facilities of many of these places are not available, even though they may have the price, and any traveler to whom they are not available, is thereby faced with many and sometimes difficult problems.”
The 1956 guide offered “Assured protection for the Negro Traveler.”
For nearly seven decades of the 20th century decisions regarding where to sleep, eat, get the car repaired or access emergency medical care were anything but commonplace for the African American and travelling only exacerbated the situation. The lack of critical knowledge could create insurmountable obstacles, humiliation and the potential for life threatening situations.
Hungry, tired or needing a restroom, a travelling Black family would anxiously wonder where to stop or even where to inquire. If there was a restaurant that served “coloreds,” would they have to go the window or door in the back?
It is not hard to imagine that the challenges prevented many from venturing out of the safety of their immediate neighborhood. However, Victor H. Green, born November 9, 1892 in New York City to parents believed to have emigrated from Virginia, recognized the problem and decided to do something about it.
A United States postal worker in New York and New Jersey for 39 years, in 1936 he expanded his previously published New York metropolitan area guide to include all the United States and a few international properties. The guide was a huge success and at its height was printing 15,000 copies a year.
During the Jim Crow years, Esso Standard Oil Co. was one of the few, if not the only, oil company that franchised gas stations to African Americans. Successful marketing of this endeavor required the employment of African American sales reps and appropriate advertising strategies. Esso endorsed the Green Book and purchased ads within the guide.
The guide was organized by state, town and type of service i.e. hotels, restaurants, beauty salons, garages. Services in the Culpeper, Madison and Orange area were not identified in the 1949 issue.
Characterized as a visionary, Victor Green was quite the entrepreneur and along with the guide offered reservation services for extended travel to other countries as well as cruises and group tours.
Recognizing that there would come a time when the service would longer be required, he wrote in the 1949 issue:
“There will be a day sometime in the near future when this guide will not have to be published. That is when we as a race will have equal opportunities and privileges in the United States. It will be a great day for us to suspend this publication for then we can go wherever we please, and without embarrassment.”
The last issue was published in 1964, the same year that the United States Congress passed the Civil Rights Act.
Until next week, be well.