Atlanta’s history is full of treasures that are still with us in one form or another. One of the more astonishing relics from the Jim Crow era is The Negro Travelers’ Green Book: The Guide to Travel and Vacations.

The Green Book was an important part of American-American safety during a period of oppression, racism and discrimination.

The book was first published in 1954 by New York City’s Victor Hugo Green, an African-American who was a mailman and travel writer based in Harlem.

In this article we’re going to look at the most famous Atlanta locations mentioned in The Green Book.

Here Are All The Green Book Locations In Atlanta

Atlanta played a pivotal role in Green Book locations for hotels, restaurants, beauty salons and barber shops.

This list is not an exhaustive one showing all of the Atlanta locations. For that, we recommend you buy the literal Green Book to benefit its publisher. Here it is below:

Buy It Here

Not unsurprisingly, many of these sites were located in the Sweet Auburn district. This area was a black section of the city just east of downtown that thrived amid Jim Crow.

Hotel Royal

214 Auburn Ave NE Atlanta, Ga
Green Book Locations In Atlanta
This hotel located in the Citizens Trust Bank building was originally called the McKay Hotel, but was changed in 1949 to Hotel Royal.
One year later, Carrie Cunningham, a former circus performer, bought the Top Hat Club and renamed it Royal Peacock. Under the control of “Mama” Cunningham, it became a top-tier music venue on the “Chitlin Circuit.”
Cunningham’s daughter Delois Scott said this about the famed Auburn Avenue institution: ““In some of the articles that have been written about the Royal Peacock, it has been likened to the Apollo, but the Peacock was the Peacock, and the Apollo was the Apollo, in my estimation. Everybody calls the Royal Peacock the ‘incubator’ for artists. When Little Richard first started playing here, he was an unknown. When Ray Charles was first starting out and unknown, he played here. James Brown, unknown. Gladys Knight and Pips, unknown. Nat King Cole played here before he even started singing. He was just playing piano in the Nat King Cole Trio — I have the picture, from those days before he sang.”
The Royal Peacock would become a top venue for live performances in the South. The likes of Etta James and more would stop by to hone their skills on their rise to stardom.

‘Mack Hotel’

548 Bedford Place, Atlanta, Ga. 30312

Green Book Locations In Atlanta
Bedford Place no longer exists. It is now Central Park Place and lofts and apartment complexes dot the landscape. This street is in the heart of Midtown Atlanta’s Old Fourth Ward.
Bedford Place used to be a longtime residential area for blacks under the poverty line. Nearby, there are still some pockets of disenfranchisement that exist.

‘Shaw Hotel’

245 Auburn Avenue, Atlanta, Ga.
Green Book Locations In Atlanta
Photo credit: Google Maps
From its address, this building appears to be part of a block of buildings constructed by black millionaire entrepreneur and former slave Alonzo Herndon, the founder of the Atlanta Life Insurance Company.
In the Green Book, the listing says “Shaw” for reasons not apparent. I have not been able to find a “Shaw Hotel” in any historical information.

Butler Street YMCA

22 Jesse Hill Jr Dr NE, Atlanta, GA 30303
Green Book Locations In Atlanta
Photo credit: aaregistry.com
The Butler Street YMCA was known as the “Black City Hall” for much of its existence. In addition to being a meeting place for the city’s black leaders, The Y had some mean basketball going on inside.
So much so that a Butler Street YMCA team often scheduled against collegians, according to the Black Fives Foundation, a historical group.
Butler Street was later renamed in honor of civil rights activist and businessman Jesse Hill, who actually lived at the YMCA for a time.

Waluhaje Hotel Apartments

Green Book Locations In Atlanta
Photo credit: Google Maps
The Waluhaje Hotel Apartments were constructed by Atlanta developer Walter H. “Chief” Aiken in the early 1950s.
The name Waluhaje originated came from combining the first two letters of the names of Aikens (Walter), his wife (Lucy), and two of her siblings (Hazel and Jefferson), according to AtlantaTimeMachine.com.
This building now serves as home offices for the Atlanta Job Corps.

Suttons restaurant

Green Book Locations In Atlanta
Photo credit: Google Maps
Suttons was a restaurant known across the country as a place African-Americans could get a good home-cooked meal.
It was owned by one Scottie Sutton, who was affectionately called “Ma” Sutton.
Here’s an account from the book, “Living Atlanta: An Oral History of the City, 1914-1948” by Clifford M. Kuhn on Ma Sutton told by one Horace Sinclair:
“They called her Ma Sutton,” recalls Sinclair. “Everybody all over the country would come to Atlanta and go get a decent meal at Ma Sutton’s. She would really set the table. You’d get everything on the table just like you would be at home, serve yourself. You’d have meats and vegetables of all kinds, light rolls, cornbread, coffee, milk or tea. She’d even put preserves on the table, all that stuff.”

Paschals Bros restaurant

180 Northside Dr SW #B, Atlanta, GA 3031

837 Hunter St. Atlanta, Ga.
Green Book Locations In Atlanta
Photo credit: Google Maps
The most famous black restaurant in Atlanta, Paschals traces its roots back to 1947. That’s when brothers James and Robert Paschal opened their first location at 831 West Hunter Street.
Paschals became an unofficial meeting place for the civil rights movement.

In 1959, Paschal’s Restaurant & Coffee Shop opened at 830 Hunter Street. The new facilities were financed with a $75,000 loan from Citizens Trust Bank in conjunction with Atlanta Life Insurance Company. This was one of the largest loans made by the bank at that time, according to the restaurant’s website.

Today Paschals is located on Northside Drive in Castleberry Hill section of downtown Atlanta. The famed eatery is one of the best black-owned restaurants in Atlanta.

‘The Blackeret’

848 Mayson Turner Rd, Atlanta Ga. 30314
Green Book Locations In Atlanta

The Blackeret was a tavern located on Mayson Turner Road not far from black Atlanta’s educational center of colleges and universities.

Poro Beauty Parlor

250 Auburn Avenue, Atlanta, Ga. 30303

Green Book Locations In Atlanta
Photo credit: Google Maps

The Poro Beauty Parlor sprang up at 250 Auburn Avenue when Ella Martin moved o Atlanta in 1930.

Martin was a representative of the Poro Beauty College founded by black cosmetics pioneer Annie Malone out of St. Louis, according to the book “Historical Roots of the Urban Crisis: Blacks in the Industrial City 1900-1950.”

None other than Madame C.J. Walker began her career in beauty products as a selling agent for Malone’s Poro business. Walker would go on to build her own hair care empire within the African-American community and the world.

Madam CJ Walker in Atlanta

Walker’s impact on the U.S. hair care industry is undebatable. Right off Auburn Avenue, the Madam CJ Walker Museum sits at 54 Hilliard St NE, Atlanta, GA 30312.

Atlanta Daily World

145 Auburn Ave NE, Atlanta, GA 30303

Green Book Locations In Atlanta
Photo credit: Google Maps

The Atlanta Daily World, the city’s oldest black newspaper, has a long and rich history of documenting the plight of African-Americans and the world around them. This was also a place of unrequited truth for blacks traveling through town looking for some news.

The newspaper was founded August 5, 1928 by William Alexander Scott II,  a 26-year-old wonderkid with keen business sense.

Headquartered on Auburn Avenue, Scott would go on to circulate The Chattanooga Tribune, The Memphis World, and The Chattanooga Tribune, establishing the first chain of African American newspapers.

Final Thought

Auburn Avenue has been overshadowed lately by other streets with headline-grabbing development, but it holds a special place in the hearts of native Atlantans.

If you have a chance to visit, patronize one of the businesses on Auburn Avenue. Stop in and take a look at The Apex Museum or other historical places there.

And don’t forget to read the book below.

In the 1950s, Auburn Avenue was once known as “the richest Negro street in the world.” The moniker “Sweet Auburn” was purportedly coined by John Wesley Dobbs, the grandfather of the city’s first black mayor Maynard Jackson.

The rest, as they say, is history.

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