The Green Book
Before the Green Book, Black Americans traveling in the United States depended on a network of Black hospitality born of necessity. Jim Crow laws in the South barred Black travelers from white hotels, resorts, and restaurants; but discriminatory practices and informal exclusion were widespread outside the South as well. Even where civil-rights statutes existed, welcome and safety were far from guaranteed.
Middle-class Black travelers drew on a tradition of mutual aid: private homes, boardinghouses, churches, and Black-owned businesses served as safe havens. Hosts would open their doors and often provide meals and lodging to strangers of the same race, a practice rooted in community responsibility and the recognition that travel posed real dangers—denial of services, harassment, arrest, or violence. These acts of hospitality were less about social ritual and more about survival and solidarity.
Willis Duke Weatherford, in Race Relations (1934), documented aspects of this system: many Black travelers depended on recommendations and word-of-mouth to locate hospitable households and businesses. Listings in local Black newspapers, church bulletins, and personal referrals helped create informal itineraries. Travelers carried letters of introduction, and host families—despite limited resources—frequently took in guests because they understood the stakes. This network extended beyond lodging: Black undertakers, barbers, restaurateurs, and taxi drivers often coordinated to assist visitors, creating a patchwork of services that could reliably be counted on where mainstream establishments refused service.
The practice reflected broader patterns of Black civic life in the early 20th century—self-help, mutual aid, and institution-building in the face of exclusion. While this system could not erase the humiliation and danger of segregation, it offered a practical and humane response: a community-organized safety net that let Black Americans travel with a measure of dignity and security until formal guides like the Green Book mapped those refuges more systematically.
