3. Wilmington, N.C.

2022 Census population estimate: 453,722 Largest city’s population: Wilmington - 120,324 (2022 Census estimate)

Downtown Wilmington, NC | Ennis Davis, AICP

Named for Spencer Compton, First Earl of Wilmington, Wilmington was incorporated on February 20, 1739, and grew to become an important port that played a critical role in the years leading up to the American Revolution. After the Civil War, Wilmington became prosperous as a majority-Black and racially integrated city. However, in 1898, white supremacists successfully overthrew the city’s government. This event, the Wilmington Insurrection of 1898, is also known as the Wilmington Race Riot. Following the insurrection, Charlotte surpassed Wilmington as the largest city in North Carolina.

Following the opening of the final extension of Interstate 40 in 1990, Wilmington has become a rapidly growing city and is now the second-fastest-growing large metropolitan area in the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor. Today, Wilmington is home to nearly 120,000 residents and in recent years, its 1.75-mile Downtown riverfront was ranked as the Best American Riverfront by readers of USA Today.

1989 Memorial Park is a memorial to the 1898 Insurrection of Wilmington. This race riot and massacre caused the maternal great grandfather of this writer to relocate to Florida to establish a new life. | Ennis Davis

Wilmington’s North 4th Street was once the city’s primary African American business district. | Ennis Davis

2. Charleston–North Charleston, S.C.

2022 Census population estimate: 839,529 Largest city’s population: Charleston - 153,672 (2022 Census estimate)

Historic buildings on Charleston’s Meeting Street | Ennis Davis

Historically, Charleston has been the largest city most associated with the Gullah Geechee culture. Named in honor of King Charles II, Charleston was established in 1670. The city’s historic significance is tied to its role as a major slave trading port. It has been said that of the estimated 400,000 captive Africans transported into the country to be sold into slavery, nearly one-half arrived in Charleston. As a result, by the mid-18th century, Charleston had become the hub of the Atlantic slave trade and the fourth largest city in the colonies behind New York, Philadelphia, and Boston. With the large number of plantations surrounding the city, its plantation-based economy made it the wealthiest city of the 13 colonies. As late as 1840, Charleston was the 10th-largest city in the country and second-largest in the South behind New Orleans.

Charleston’s Gullah Geechee population grew from 17,000 in 1860 to more than 27,000 in 1880 as formerly enslaved from surrounding lowcountry plantations flocked to the city after the Civil War. However, the loss of free African labor devastated the city’s wealth after the Civil War, and its economy languished through much of the 20th century. Its struggling economy assisted in the preservation of pre-Civil War building stock during major growth periods of the 20th century where many growing cities took advantage of urban renewal strategies and new development opportunities to raze and replace significant portions of their old building stock. Today, Charleston’s largely preserved historic districts bring in more than 7 million tourists a year, according to the College of Charleston Office of Tourism. Widely known for successful urban revitalization since the 1980s and 1990s, ongoing gentrification is a major challenge to Charleston’s historic Gullah Geechee neighborhoods.

Residences in Charleston’s Gullah Geechee Eastside neighborhood | Ennis Davis

The Mount Sinai Holiness Church of Deliverance on Cooper Street in Charleston’s Eastside neighborhood | Ennis Davis

1. Jacksonville, Florida

2022 Census population estimate: 1,675,668 Largest city’s population: Jacksonville - 971,319 (2022 Census estimate)

Friendship Fountain in Downtown Jacksonville | Ennis Davis

While the corridor’s older urban centers like Charleston, Savannah and Wilmington are commonly associated with their colonial and antebellum prominence, Jacksonville is representative of a Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor city that economically benefited from the Confederacy’s loss to the Union. Dating back to 1822, Jacksonville played a secondary role to its neighbor St. Augustine prior to the Civil War.

Established in 1565 by the Spanish, St. Augustine is the oldest continuously inhabited European-established settlement in the contiguous U.S. As early as 1738, it was also home to Fort Mose, the first legally sanctioned Black settlement in what would become the U.S. St. Augustine’s prominence declined following the end of the Second Seminole War in 1842, as the St. Johns River emerged as a major Northeast Florida economic engine.

As a river port, Jacksonville became a city where enslaved laborers were loggers, turpentiners, pilots, stevedores, carpenters, masons, and mill hands. It was also a place where agricultural products cultivated at surrounding plantations were shipped to market. Its population grew from 450 in 1842 to more than 2,100, surpassing St. Augustine by 1860.

After the Civil War, Jacksonville emerged as a major regional railroad center and Gilded Era tourist destination. Rapidly increasing in population, the city surpassed Wilmington around 1895 and both Savannah and Charleston in the early 20th century. By 1915, it had become the largest city in the region now recognized as the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor.

For Gullah Geechee descendants in Florida, Georgia and South Carolina, it was known as the “Magic City” during an era when its population increased from 28,429 in 1900 to 129,549 by 1930. As of July 2022, Jacksonville’s population had increased to 971,319. While one will be hard pressed to find certain cultural aspects like sweetgrass baskets in the city, the Gullah Geechee influence is still a dominant part of Jacksonville’s landscape, culture, cuisine, music, architecture, and religious organizations.

The ruins of tabby enslaved cabins at Kingsley Plantation on Fort George Island in Jacksonville | Ennis Davis

Cosmo is a Gullah Geechee community near Mill Cove in Jacksonville. | Ennis Davis

Historic shotgun houses on East Union Street in Jacksonville’s Eastside neighborhood | Ennis Davis

Editorial by Ennis Davis, AICP. Contact Ennis at edavis@moderncities.com