By Garry Blanson
While I was online reminding my Facebook friends that “two Negro neighborhoods” were once established on the land near, around, or maybe even on the land where the “old Holiday Inn” used to be located, it was brought to my attention that most Black and white people’s knowledge of the past history of Monroe, Louisiana, simply does not go back that far.
Well, for those who didn’t know, the two former Negro neighborhoods that I am speaking of are the old Bright Oak and the old Jackson Quarters neighborhoods. Sadly to say, had it not been for my rigorous research efforts, I probably would have never known about these two former Negro communities either.
By the way, the land where the old Holidome Hotel used to be located used to be owned by Black people too. It seems that due to the eminent domain laws, many Negroes who lived in the area of the Booker T. Washington Subdivision and Highway 165 were forced to sell their homes and land for pennies on the dollar.
Needless to say, I feel that going forward it is imperative that the older generation of Black citizens of Monroe do a better job of passing down the legacy as well as the history of our Black ancestors who once lived here in Monroe and helped pave the way for us today.
With that said, on to this week’s Black pioneer, Garth C. Reeves, Sr. Anyone familiar with the Miami Times Newspaper has probably heard of the name Garth C. Reeves, Sr. The Miami Times, South Florida’s largest Black-owned newspaper, was founded in 1923 by Henry Ethelbert Sigismund Reeves.
For over two decades, Garth oversaw the day-to-day operations of the Miami Times Newspaper after taking ownership of the paper following his father’s death in 1970. When it came to defending the civil rights of Negroes, Garth was a fearless fighter for the Negro cause as well as a staunch supporter.
In 1949, Garth and a group of his Negro friends filed a lawsuit over the city’s unfair policy toward Black citizens using its public golf course, which led to the desegregation of the Miami Springs Golf Course in 1959.
Interestingly, during the Civil Rights Movement era, Garth was one of the leading Negro figures in Miami, Florida. You see, Garth believed and sometimes participated in the practice of civil disobedience.
In 1957, Garth, a group of Negro leaders, and a few Negro citizens decided to challenge the City of Miami’s beach policy of not allowing Negroes to swim or sit on the beach. The morning that the group went to the public beach in Dade County, Florida, they were met with a parade of armed policemen.
Although there was plenty of police presence that day at the beach, Garth and everyone else were allowed to stay and swim, and Negroes have been attending the beaches of Florida ever since.
To his surprise, when Garth retired from his duties at the Miami Times in 1994, he was officially named Publisher Emeritus. Additionally, in 2017, Garth was inducted into the National Association of Black Journalists Hall of Fame.
Finally, in 2019, after his wife Rachel passed away, Garth’s health went downhill. Sadly, on November 25, 2019, after living for a little more than an entire century, Garth C. Reeves went home to be with the Lord.
