Historic Avenue Cultural Center

The architecturally and historically significant Historic Avenue Cultural Center is an exhibit and event space that serves as an anchor to Mobile, Alabama’s budding Civil Rights and Cultural Heritage District. From the early 1990s to approximately 2015, it served as the National African American Archives and Museum. Formerly known as the Davis Avenue Branch of Mobile Public Library, it was the lone Black library in Mobile County during segregation.

History
The Davis Avenue Branch of the Mobile Public Library was built in 1931 to serve the needs of the local African American community. The state was racially segregated and Blacks were prohibited from using libraries designated for Whites. The three-room building was designed by architect George Bigelow Rogers and built for $26,000. The building was modeled after the Ben May Main Library but constructed on a much smaller scale. The local African-American community helped collect used books for the library and to raise funds for the acquisition of new books. During this period of Jim Crow, segregation and the disenfranchisement of African Americans in the state from the turn of the century resulted in underfunding of facilities for them by the state and local governments. African Americans also attended separate schools.

A minor addition was made to the building in 1961. Following desegregation in the late 1960s after federal civil rights legislation was passed, this branch library became used as a storage repository for government documents. The former library building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983.

In 1992 the Mobile City Council leased the building to a community group that founded the National African American Archives and Multicultural Museum. Delores S. Dees was the organization's first president and executive director. Its exhibits interpreted the history of African Americans in the city and state, and in the United States. The collection included documents, records, photographs, books, African carvings, furniture, and special collections that relate to the African-American experience in the United States, and artifacts representing the numerous contributions African Americans have made to greater Mobile.

The National African American Archives and Museum closed around 2015 and the City-owned building was dormant for several years. In 2018, a City of Mobile-Mobile County Commission partnership spearheaded by County Commissioner Merceria Ludgood and City Councilor Levon Manzie breathed new life into the building. Mobile County Commission leased, restored, and expanded the former Davis Avenue Library to become a cultural center on the once-bustling “Black Main Street” known as The Avenue. The building reopened in October 2023 as the Historic Avenue Cultural Center.

Exhibits
The inaugural exhibit “Remembering the Avenue” was curated by Jada Jones through the Alabama Contemporary Arts Center’s Guest Curator Program. Regular, culturally significant programming occurs at the Historic Avenue Cultural Center, such as Protest on The Avenue or Poetry on The Avenue.

The Historic Avenue Cultural Center's opening just months after the July 8, 2023 opening of Clotilda: The Exhibition at Africatown Heritage House helped Mobile, Alabama earn several travel accolades, such as being named by Conde Nast Traveler as one of the Top 24 Places To Go in North America and The Caribbean in 2024.