A Conversation with Alvin Hall, Author of Driving the Green Book - A Black History Month Program

Alvin Hall will discuss his new book Driving the Green Book: A Road Trip Through the Living History of Black Resistance. Here Hall describes his travels using The Negro Motorist Green Book, the definitive manual to businesses where Black travelers could safely rest, eat and sleep from 1936 to 1967, as his guide.

The conversation with Alvin Hall will be moderated by Janée Woods Weber, an activist, advocate, facilitator, trainer for social justice issues, and Hall's fellow traveler.

For countless Americans, the open road has long been a place where dangers lurk. In the era of Jim Crow, Black travelers encountered locked doors, hostile police and potentially violent encounters almost everywhere, in both the south and the north. Millions relied on The Negro Motorist Green Book to feel safe while traveling.

Alvin Hall set out to revisit the world of the Green Book. With his friend Janée Woods Weber, he drove from New York to Detroit to New Orleans, visiting motels, restaurants, shops, and stores where Black Americans once found a friendly welcome. They explored historical and cultural landmarks, from the theaters and clubs where stars like Duke Ellington and Lena Horne performed to the Lorraine Motel where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated. Along the way, they gathered memories from some of the last living witnesses for whom the Green Book meant survival.

Q&A and book singing. Copies of Driving the Green Book will be available for purchase by Elm Street Books.

Registration required.

Pre-event reception from 6 to 6:30 p.m. generously sponsored by Hudson Structured Capital Management LTD.

Photo credit: Jim Franco