In the Jim Crow era, black travelers in the United States often had a difficult time finding hotels that would allow them to stay, or restaurants and other facilities that would allow them to purchase goods and services. Racist practices dominated…

Read's was a popular chain of drug stores/luncheonettes in the 20th century with approximately 39 outlets around Baltimore, scattered around central Maryland; It was the Walgreens of its day, with lunch spots. Like many establishments of a…

The current Roye-Williams Elementary School began it's building life as a segregated, all-black school serving the Havre de Grace/Aberdeen area of Harford county. In 1953, Harford County Public Schools opened the K-12 Havre de Grace…

The Flying Clipper was a relatively upscale and spacious restaurant, nightclub and motel on Route 40 in Aberdeen at the time of the 1961 Freedom Ride. The CORE brochure listed it as "Still Segregated," hence it was a likely Freedom Rider…

The New Ideal Diner existed in downtown Aberdeen, Maryland in 1961 and into the 21st century. In 1961, it was listed as the "Ideal" restaurant in the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) brochure for Freedom Riders and listed as…

In 1961, the Aberdeen Diner existed in the south western edge of Aberdeen, along Route 40 near a creek and where a 7-11 store currently stands. When Freedom Riders came through Aberdeen, they stopped at the diner. They were met by the owner reading…

The Bayou is a well-known restaurant in Havre de Grace, Maryland on Route 40. It opened in 1949 and continued to operate in 2021. In early December 1961, the CORE leadership found out that some of the restaurants on Route 40 were in fact still…

The Bonnie Brae diner in Edgewood, Maryland was the site of an incident involving an African diplomat in June 1961.They were made famous by reporting in LIFE magazine. The diner’s owners denied service to the Ambassador from Chad (Adam Malik Sow)…

In 1951, the K-12 Central Consolidated School opened in an area called Hickory outside Bel Air, Maryland to serve black students from the central and northern regions of Harford County, Maryland. All the students and teachers in the school were…

In the early 1950s, the Harford County Board of Education opened two K-12 schools to separately educate the county’s African American children. These two schools would take students from the numerous black-only elementary schools dotting the county…