Beale Street

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Beale Street.
Beale Street

The Beale Street is a street in downtown Memphis in the US state of Tennessee . It runs 1.8 miles from Mississippi to East Street. The street is considered the "home of the blues ".

history

Beale Street was built in 1841 by contractor Robertson Topp (1807–1876) as Beale Avenue and named after an unknown war hero. During the American Civil War , General Ulysses S. Grant had his headquarters here for a time. After the war, mainly Afro-Americans and Irish settled in this area, between whom there was repeated unrest, as well as Jews, Italians and Germans.

The 1870s saw severe cholera and yellow fever epidemics that killed large parts of the population. The African Americans were less vulnerable and rebuilt the neighborhood. With Robert Church there was the first black millionaire in the USA.

In the early 20th century, Beale Street was an amusement center with gambling dens, saloons, prostitution and crime. But the street was also the center of black music in America. In September 1912 WC Handy composed his first successful blues here, the Memphis Blues . Handy also came up with the 1916 Beale Street Blues , which helped change the name of the street from Beale Avenue to Beale Street . From the 1920s to the 1940s, blues and jazz greats like Louis Armstrong , Muddy Waters , Albert King , Memphis Minnie , BB King and many others played on Beale Street and helped develop the Memphis Blues .

During the Great Depression , the street began to go into disrepair. On May 23, 1966, part of Beale Street from Main Street to 4th Street was granted National Historic Landmark status. Since October 1966, this section is listed as a Historic District under the designation Beale Street Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places . On December 15, 1977, the street was officially named the “Home of the Blues” by Congress, although it wasn't until the early 1980s that Elkington & Keltner (now Performa Entertainment Real Estate) began to build new clubs and other attractions. 1983 opened the first club of the new entertainment center Beale Street. In July 1993, the Beale Street Historic District was expanded.

present

Today Beale Street is one of the biggest tourist attractions in Memphis. Here you will find a Hard Rock Cafe , Silky O'Sullivan's, BB King's Blues Club, the FedExForum and the A. Schwab's department store in the style of the early years. The “WC Handy Park” was set up to commemorate cell phones.

The Beale Street Music Festival takes place every year on the first weekend in May in Tom Lee Park at the end of Beale Street .

literature

  • John A. Elkington, Beale Street: Resurrecting the Home of the Blues , 2008.

Web links

Beale Street site (English)

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Listing of National Historic Landmarks by State: Tennessee. National Park Service , accessed February 20, 2020.
  2. ↑ Beale Street Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places , accessed February 20, 2020.
  3. ↑ Beale Street Historic District (Boundary Increase) on the National Register of Historic Places , accessed February 20, 2020.

Coordinates: 35 ° 8 '23 "  N , 90 ° 3' 9.8"  W.