LINCOLNVILLE, Fla. – Welcome to Lincolnville!
A marker designating the historically Black neighborhood is one of the first things you’ll see when you enter the community.
It’s an area of St. Augustine rich in civil rights history, and the welcome plaque details much of it.
“Once the sight of indian villages, colonial plantations and orange groves, Lincolnville became a settlement of emancipated slaves in 1866...”
Eventually, a thriving independent Black community grew and became the site of some pivotal moments in the civil rights movement, including a march featuring Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in the 1960s.
It was designated as a historic district in 1991 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Now, thousands of people visit the 45 blocks that make up Lincolnville every month for a trip back in time, some riding trolleys along the tracks that roll through the narrow roads.
Signs throughout the area designate the ACCORD Freedom Trail, and visitors can also listen to an audio tour of the trail with a quick phone call.
Also in Lincolnville sits a special corner store built by businessman Frederick Martin that features murals highlighting important moments in the civil rights movement.
The back section of the building, along Dehaven Street, was added in the mid-1920s. It served first as a pool room, then as a barber shop. The Lincolnville Public Library, under the direction of Mrs. Dorcas B. Sanders, occupied the back section in the 1950s and 1960s, and the building served as a training ground for non-violent protest techniques, like sit-ins.
Another spot along the Freedom Trail highlights the location where a group known as the St. Augustine Four -- Audrey Neil Edwards, Joe Ann Anderson, Samuel White and Willie Carl Singleton -- participated in sit-ins. They ended up spending 6 months in jail and reform school.
Steps from the historic corner store, a place of worship remains active today.
St. Paul AME Church has been a cornerstone of Black culture, religion and history, and many civil rights leaders spoke at the church, including King, the Rev. Ralph Abernathy, Hosea Williams and the Rev. Andrew Young.
Inside, the church still features the pulpit and chair King used during his visit.
Young told News4JAX he “became a man” in St. Augustine when he made the life-or-death decision to protest peacefully in its streets during the civil rights movement. Those marches took people to the town square, where steps now memorialize those important moments from 1964.
Just across the street from the AME church is a block of property owned by the Catholic Church that includes a school that Black and indigenous children attended.
As you walk toward the town square along the river, you’ll see a hotel that was once the Monson Motor Lodge, the site of another key moment in the civil rights movement.
On June 18, 1964, civil rights activists attempted to integrate the lodge’s “whites-only” swimming pool, and owner James Brock poured acid into the pool.
The infamous images of his horrendous act contributed to public outcry and helped in passing the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Another area of Lincolnville was once a thriving open market, guard house and watch tower, but it eventually became a slave market.
And the former Excelsior School was the first public Black high school in St. Johns County in 1925, which became the education hub for Otis Mason, who went on to become the first African American elected school superintendent in the state of Florida.
The Excelsior School building is now home to The Lincolnville Museum and Cultural Center.
So the next time you’re in St. Augustine and want to learn about life in the 1960s and the civil rights movement, make a stop in Lincolnville.