Cape May Exhibit Gives Perspective On Vanished Black-owned Businesses

CAPE MAY – Dozens of questions from a full audience in the Carriage House at the Mid-Atlantic Center for the Arts and Humanities (MAC) were answered by community members during the panel discussion of “The Way We Were” exhibit Feb. 16.
In celebration of Black History Month, panel members included William “Bill” Cottman, Emily Dempsey, Willie Hicks, Wanda Wise Evelyn, and CCA historian Yvonne Wright-Gary. The event was sponsored by the Center for Community Arts (CCA) in association with MAC to promote the exhibit on Cape May County’s once-thriving black business communities.
Panelists described the use of eminent domain to take homes from residents for as little as $500. On Chestnut, Jackson, and Broadway, if a property did not have the “gingerbread look” it was torn down. A local doctor was able to afford legal help and managed to “put on the brakes” in some cases and the Steven Smith House still stands because Amelia Hampton wrote a letter asking President Johnson to intervene. The former Opera House was being used as a USO for black military and community center for kids but was bulldozed to make way for a parking lot.
Panel members informed the audience that the first African American settlement was believed to be in Lower Township in 1831 and that blacks worked in the service industry in Cape May and became homeowners.
The Hughes family was thought to have been the last of the slave owners. Panelists also said that blacks shopped at most white businesses, but movie theatres were segregated. Blacks were only permitted to buy food to take out at white restaurants.
Four picnic grounds were established in Wildwood to serve African Americans. Local black homeowners also opened back and side yards to sell refreshments and provided changing and shower rooms to day visitors. African American entertainers performing in Wildwood clubs were not permitted to stay in white hotels, so black establishments housed the Isley Brothers, Chubby Checker, Ed Townsend, Dinah Washington, Sarah Vaughan, Count Basie and others.
Beaches were also segregated. Blacks used Grant Street in Cape May. In Wildwood, there were two streets designated for blacks, Lincoln and Garfield, known as “Chicken Bone Beaches.” The lifeguards there were also black. There were different schools for blacks and whites but children walked to school together, played on the same playground, and walked home together, they said.
Bernadette Matthews, executive director for CCA, told the Herald the exhibit is proof there were more than 60 businesses in the prosperous African American community in Historic Cape May in the early 20th century, including churches, hotels, hair salons, pubs, bakeries, pool halls, etc. She said the main thing that happened when the Great Society improved public housing was the destruction of many businesses, giving credence to what are considered to be businesses hiding in plain sight.
Matthews shared CCA’s goal to see substantial movement in its plan to open a gallery for future events at the Franklin Street School, future home of CCA, by the end of this year.
The Way We Were exhibit is open Saturdays through March 22 and daily, March 28 through April 13. Admission is free, gallery hours vary.
For gallery information, call MAC, 1048 Washington St. (609) 884-5404. For information on the exhibit, call CCA (609) 884-7525 or visit CenterforCommunityarts.org.
To contact Linda Duffy, email lduffy@cmcherald.com.