Description
Walk through Bronzeville with Jazz performer Maggie Brown and explore the neighborhood’s golden age and unexpected decline.
Starting Location
4633 S Dr Martin Luther King Jr Dr
Duration
55 minutes
Description
Over the years Bronzeville has been called a lot of things: the Black Metropolis, the Black Belt, a city within a city; but jazz singer Maggie Brown calls it home. Her grandfather helped build the community in the darkest days of segregation, and since then it's nurtured four generations of her family.
When segregation kept African Americans from living almost anywhere else in Chicago, people like Maggie's grandfather worked to create a place where the black community could not only survive, but also flourish. And soon Bronzeville was a dynamic neighborhood where black-owned business, activists, and artists that influenced the whole country, thrived.
Let Maggie take you back in time to the age of Dizzy, Louis, Mahalia and Muddy. You'll walk past beautiful mansions where the working class and the weld side-by-side, visit a church where Dr. Martin uther King Jr. spoke, and drop into a hip new restaurant that's becoming a community gathering spot. You'll learn how this vibrant community blossomed and thrived in the 30s and 40s, fell in the 60s and 70s, and why residents today think it's on the rise again.
You don't know Chicago until you've taken a stroll through Bronzeville.
Tips & Hours
- This Detour can be taken anytime but is best between 9am - 4pm Monday through Thursday, 9am-5:30 pm Friday, and 9am - 12:30 pm on Saturday when all of the businesses along the route are open.
- If you want to eat at Peach’s at the end of the Detour, be sure to start the walk before 2pm.
Credits
Narrator
Maggie Brown
Head of Content
Heather Schuster
Executive Producer
Stephanie Jenz
Producer Donna Wilson
Editors
Marianne McCune
Avi Glijansky
Consulting Producer
Rachel Dickson
Associate Producer
Sara Medlin
Production Assistant
Casey Hudetz
Sound Design
Noise Floor Stosh Tuszynski Devin Delaney
Music Direction
Noise Floor Stosh Tuszynski Devin Delaney
Featured Music
“A Great Migration” Written and Performed by Maggie Brown Courtesy of Magnolia Warbler Music “Long as You’re Living” Written by Oscar Brown Jr. Performed by Maggie Brown Courtesy of Bootblack Publishing, LLC “Rags ‘n Old Iron” Written by Oscar Brown Jr. Performed by Maggie Brown Courtesy of Bootblack Publishing, LLC
Featured Voices
Jeanette Simpson
Cliff Roam
Quote from “By a Thread” Written by Oscar Brown Sr, Courtesy of Maggie Brown
Image Credits
• Cover Photo: Danielle Scruggs
• Navigation Photos: Sara Medlin
• WPA photographers: Russell Lee, Edwin Rosskam
Special Thanks
Todd Wood
Lamar Burris
Cliff Roam
Jeanette Simpson
Harold Lucas
Natalie Moor
Starting Locations of All Detours