The Unknown Florida

If you go to the location below Apalachee Parkway where the photo of the New Capitol in the introduction was taken, you are at the location of the now lost Smokey Hollow neighborhood, an African-American community in downtown Tallahassee that was destroyed in the early 1960s to make place for the new elevated highway. The New Capitol, a twenty-two-story neoclassicist building, was constructed in 1977 and is now part of the Florida Capitol Complex. Whereas in Gloria Jahoda’s book “The Other Florida” from 1967 Smokey Hollow was described as a slum that was cleared for urban renewal, it was actually a thriving black community and home to churches, homes (shotgun style), restaurants , stores, other businesses (like a barbershop) and hundreds of residents. As the history of many black American neighborhoods have become appreciated only recently, the city of Tallahassee decided to commemorate the lost part of town with a memorial in 2013, which is also part of the National Register of Historic Districts.  The memorial includes photos and descriptions of how homes would have been furnished at the time and the fully restored community barbershop. At the center of the memorial is a reflecting pond that invites visitors to contemplate on this lost African-American chapter of Tallahassee.