Dear Travelers, Thank You…
Groups of African Americans have always traveled both domestically and internationally. We want to take a moment to say: Dear Travelers, Thank You for yesterday, today, and tomorrow. The below travel timeline is our first attempt to begin to establish the history of groups of African Americans migrating and traveling in America.
These are the broad strokes of our travel history. We invite you to add to or leave a comment to help us modify the below timeline.
Brief History of Our Travel in America
| 1850 – 1860 | Harriet Tubman, the most famous and most successful of Underground Railroad conductors, lead as many as 19 trips from the South to the North in what is estimated to have been more than 300 African Americans being guided from slavery to freedom. |
| 1916 – 1940 | The Great Black Migration – African Americans migrating from the rural South to the Northeast and Midwest with the biggest migration of African Americans moving to: New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Denver, Detroit, Pittsburgh and Indianapolis. |
| 1936 | The First Green Book published |
| 1940 – 1970 | Great Black Migration (Second Wave) African Americans migrating from the largely the urban South to the Northeast, Midwest, and now the West, which include: Los Angeles, San Francisco, Oakland, Phoenix, Seattle, and Portland. |
| 1955 | Jacob & Freddye Henderson founded Henderson Travel Service making it the oldest full-service African American-owned travel company and the first to take large groups of travelers to Africa. |
| 1974 | National Brotherhood of Skiers –Changed the face of Skiing by creating the Black Ski Summit to identify and discuss problems and subjects which were unique to the African American skiing population, ski and socialize. Their primary purpose of the organization was also to place an African American skier on the U.S. Ski Team at that time. Today they have as many as 55 clubs across 43 cities. |
| 2011 | Nomadness Travel Tribe -launched an online community of travelers of color with the majority of the travelers being African American female travelers |
| 2013 | Travel Noire a digital media company that serves millennials in the African diaspora was launched. |
| 2020 – | WHERE DO YOU FIT? |
To date, there are numerous other African American travel companies, groups, and events that focus on travelers of African descent. You play the most significant role in our history because the reality is most of our people will likely never travel abroad.
It is your Instagram posts, Facebook timelines, YouTube videos, Live Videos, podcasts, blogs and more that encourage and inspire those who are unable to travel.
You also, inspire people around the world. Some of which have limited interactions with others outside of their community. As you can see from the timeline, there’s a lot of room in the travel industry.
We challenge you to figure out where you fit in.
To our dear community, thank you for traveling with us. Your continuous support has touched so many lives around the world. We are forever thankful for you.
