1. Jacksonville was an early 20th century Black metropolis
Dinner hour on Jacksonville’s riverfront docks during the first decade of the 20th century. | Library of Congress
Founded by Isaiah D. Hart in 1822, Jacksonville grew into an antebellum river port where enslaved African laborers worked as loggers, turpentiners, pilots, stevedores, carpenters, masons, and mill hands. It was also a hub for shipping agricultural products from surrounding plantations to market. After the Civil War, Jacksonville developed into a major regional railroad center and a popular tourist destination during the Gilded Age.
For Gullah Geechee descendants in Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina, Jacksonville was known as the “Magic City” during an era when African Americans flocked to the city seeking economic opportunities. By 1900, African Americans made up 57% of Jacksonville’s population, setting it apart from the racial demographics of other Southern cities at the time.
2. Home to the largest train station south of Washington, D.C.
Completed in 1919, the Jacksonville Terminal was designed by New York-based architect Kenneth M. Murchison and modeled after Penn Station. Many of Murchison’s first major commissions were railroad stations constructed for the Pennsylvania Railroad company. | State Archives of Florida
In 1893, Henry F. Flagler established the Jacksonville Terminal Company in LaVilla, just west of downtown. Officially incorporated on April 7, 1894, the company’s Union Depot passenger railroad station opened its doors on February 4, 1895. By 1912, with at least 92 trains passing through daily, plans were made to construct what would become the largest train station south of Washington, D.C. In 1915, New York architect Kenneth Murchison was selected to design the new terminal.
Murchison’s early major commissions were for railroad stations for the Pennsylvania Railroad. Among the stations he designed were the Delaware Lackawanna Station in Hoboken, New Jersey; the Lackawanna Terminal and the Lehigh Terminal in Buffalo, New York; and Pennsylvania Station in Baltimore, Maryland. For Jacksonville’s terminal, Murchison drew significant inspiration from the design of New York’s Pennsylvania Station.
As a transportation hub, Jacksonville became the focal point of the migration during the station’s expansion. Between 1916 and 1920, the city lost more than 6,000 of its 35,000 Black residents to the Great Migration. An additional 14,000 people from surrounding rural areas passed through the station en route out of the state. Studies show that the largest proportional movements of African Americans in the South during this period occurred from West Florida, Tampa, and Jacksonville.
3. Pennsylvania Railroad recruits Jax’s disenfranchised Black labor force
African Americans at the Jacksonville Terminal, waiting for a train headed to Newark, New Jersey in 1921. Between 1916 and 1940, it is estimated that around two million African Americans migrated from the American south to New York, Chicago, Philadelphia and other northern industrial cities. | State Archives of Florida
Before World War II, railroad and manufacturing companies in northern cities relied on immigrants as their primary labor force. When the war began in Europe, the flow of immigrants to the country halted, prompting these industries to turn to African Americans in the South to fill jobs needed for their continued growth.
Around this time, the Jacksonville Terminal Company employed more than 2,000 people, making it the city’s second-largest employer. Many of these workers, including Pullman porters, section hands, and firemen, were African American.
In early 1916, the Pennsylvania Railroad began recruiting Black laborers from Jacksonville by offering higher wages and free transportation to the North for those willing to work on the railroad. The New York Central Railroad quickly followed suit, hiring 500 men from the city in June 1916 and a total of 1,500 over the following months.
With recruiting agents offering six or seven dollars a day—compared to less than a dollar a day in Jacksonville and surrounding rural areas—many African Americans were eager to leave. By 1918, more than 12,000 southern African Americans had taken advantage of the Pennsylvania Railroad’s free transportation program to the North.