Venue: Dunbar Hotel
Town: Los Angeles, US

Not to be confused with the Dunbar Hotel in Gainesville Florida, a hiatoric site on the Florida Black Heritage Trail The Dunbar Hotel, originally known as the Hotel Somerville, was the focal point of the Central Avenue African-American community in Los Angeles, California, during the 1930s and 1940s. Built in 1928 by John Alexander Somerville, it was known for its first year as the Hotel Somerville. Upon its opening, it hosted the first national convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) to be held in the western United States. In 1930, the hotel was renamed the Dunbar, and it became the most prestigious hotel in LA's African-American community. In the early 1930s, a nightclub opened at the Dunbar, and it became the center of the Central Avenue jazz scene in the 1930s and 1940s. The Dunbar hosted Duke Ellington, Cab Calloway, Billie Holiday, Louis Armstrong, Lionel Hampton, Count Basie, Lena Horne, and many other jazz legends. Other noteworthy people who stayed at the Dunbar include W. E. B. Du Bois, Joe Louis, Ray Charles, and Thurgood Marshall. Former heavyweight champion Jack Johnson also ran a nightclub at the Dunbar in the 1930s. No longer a hotel, the building was renovated in the 2010s and is now part of a larger residential community named Dunbar Village. The hotel was built in 1928 by John and Vada Somerville, socially and politically prominent black Angelenos. Vada Somerville was the first African-American woman in California to receive a Doctor of Dental Surgery degree at University of Southern California. John Alexander Somerville was the first black person to graduate from the University of Southern California. The hotel was built entirely by black contractors, laborers, and craftsmen and financed by black community members. For many years, the Somerville was the only major hotel in Los Angeles that welcomed blacks, and it quickly became the place to stay for visiting black dignitaries. In 1928, the Somerville h