1 Honors Thesis African Americans in Ybor: Minorities of the Latin

Honors Thesis African Americans in Ybor: Minorities of the Latin City Gillian Finklea April 25, 2012 1 Acknowledgements I would like to acknowledge all those who helped me complete the daunting task of writing my first paper that was over 20 pages. First, to Dr. Noll and Dr. Louthan who advised and guided me during an entire year while I wrote this paper. Also, to previous reserachers of Ybor who paved the way for future exploration into this fascinating city. Dr. Gary Mormino’s book on Italian immigrants first sparked my interest into further research, and Dr. Susan Greenbaum’s book on Afro-Cubans was so incredibly helpful in my research. Finally to my family who supported me so much in my studies, and for exposing me to the historical, wonderful place that is Ybor City. 2 Abstract Ybor City is located within the larger city of Tampa, Florida. It was founded by a Spanish Cigar maker and attracted immigrants from Spain, Cuba, and Italy. These immigrants created a truly Latinized city in the middle of Anglo-Tampa. However, not all were welcome; African Americans still faced the same discrimination they saw in other cities. While the immigrants of Ybor were supporting each other through mutual aid societies and cigar factory jobs, African Americans lived just outside the gates of the city. African Americans lived in some of the poorest slums in the South, just outside the modern city. The history of Ybor City tells a story of human interactions, oscillating between status quo and acceptance. 3 Table of Contents Acknowledgements Abstract Introduction 1 Chapter 1: Early Ybor City: Mutual aid and the beginnings of division 8 Chapter 2: Chapter 2: African Americans finding their place in Ybor City 18 Chapter 3: Chapter 3: Racial renewal, and urban renewal 26 Conclusion 34 Bibliography 37 4 Introduction Florida is the only state to fly five different flags during the course of its history. Five different countries have laid claim to this state as their own, in attempts to rule the peninsula. Because of this unique history it would be odd if Florida didn’t have a good deal of diversity woven throughout its cities. There have been many Spanish speaking Floridians from the beginnings of the state, as Spain was the first country to explore and settle in the state. Spaniards began exploring the peninsula in the early sixteenth century and set up a military outpost in St. Augustine. Eventually these descendants from Spain migrated throughout the state.1 Later Cuban refugees would come in waves in the early 1900s and later in the 1980s. Cuban refugees started out living in cities in southern Florida such as Miami and Key West. Key West had the largest Cuban community until the 1880s when the population migrated to Tampa. African Americans have also been a large part of the state’s history, and as part of Florida’s history as a slave state, with many blacks having been in Florida as longs as the Spanish. There have been Greek settlements in New Smryna and Tarpon Springs, and an Italian settlement in St. Cloud. From this information it is clear that Florida has had an influx of diversity throughout its history, spread across the entire state. However, there is one city on the west coast of central Florida, just off the Gulf of Mexico, which boasts an interesting blend of culture and history and it is the focus of this thesis: Ybor City. Ybor City is located within the larger city of Tampa, FL, a major port city on the Gulf of Mexico. In 1824 the United States federal government built a military 1 Raymond Mohl, “The Latinization of Florida.” In Florida’s Heritage of Diversity: Essays in Honor of Samuel Proctor, edited by Mark Greenberg, 155. (Tallahassee, FL: Sentry Press, 1997). 5 cantonment, Fort Brooke, in Tampa. 2 The small population that lived in Tampa participated in the Second Seminole War and surrendered to the Union Army in the Civil War, and by 1870 Tampa’s was facing a scarcity of people and an absence of industry.3 After the Civil War, Tampa, like the rest of Florida, was in economic trouble and yet possessed an abundance of cheap land. Luckily, an investor saw this as an opportunity. In 1884 Bernardino Gargol and Gavino Gutierrez, two Spaniards from New York, were looking for guavas and mangos they believed to be on Florida’s west coast. Although they did not find any they stopped by Key West and mentioned to fellow Spaniard, Vicente Martinez Ybor a successful cigar manufacturer, that the cheap land in Tampa may be just the place to expand his factories. As previously mentioned, Key West was the leader in making Cuban cigars, mainly because of its close proximity to Cuba. Vicente Ybor, along with his business partner Ignacion Haya decided to buy over 40 acres of land within Tampa and began to build their cigar factories.4 The first cigar was produced in the factory of La Flor de Sanchez and Haya on April 13,1886. By 1900 Tampa became the leading manufacturing city in Florida, not because of steel or cotton but the pure Havana rolled cigars of Ybor City. At the same time Ybor City experienced this unique introduction to the cigar industry, another industry began to affect the entire state: railroads. Henry Plant revolutionized the transportation industry in the Southeast by introducing the commercial use of the railroad to the state. In 1884 Plant created a Jacksonville-Kissimmee-Tampa 2 Niles Weekly Register, March 30,1821. 3 Gary R. Mormino, and George E. Pozzetta, The Immigrant World of Ybor City: Italians and Their Latin Neighbors in Tampa, 1885-1985 (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1987), 45. 4 Jose Rivero Muniz, The Ybor City Story, (Tallahassee, FL: Sentry Press, 1976), 83 6 connection. The Plant system crossed the entire state transforming transportation and communication in Florida.5 The local papers were astounded, stating, “Tampa never saw so many strange faces.” 6 This opened Tampa up to more citizens, many of them immigrants. With all the new residents and industry, Tampa acquired the beginnings of a major city in the late nineteenth century: sidewalks, streetlights, and an electric trolley to help the city’s internal growth. So, Ybor had a new industry, new amenities, and soon, a new population. Immigration in the late eighteenth, early nineteenth century came from mainly northern and central Europe, countries like Ireland and Germany. While they faced nativism and other obstacles adjusting to life in America, eventually they assimilated and made their way through American life. Social mobility was difficult for some, but over time the second and third generations of these immigrants were full assimilated. Beginning in the nineteenth century a new wave of immigrants came into America, this time mainly from eastern and southern Europe. 7 These immigrants were different. The first wave of immigrants were, for the most part, English speaking and from familiar cities in Europe. This second wave included countries like Italy and Greece, countries where English was not spoken and American culture not always celebrated. The first wave of immigrants did not make it to Tampa, in fact, practically no immigrants settled in Tampa or Ybor prior to 1880s. This allowed the Cubans, Spaniards, and Italians of the second wave to settle in Ybor. They faced no competition from other groups. Major 5 Margaret Carrick Fairlie, History of Florida, (Kingsport, Tennessee: Kingsport Press, 1935), 139. 6 Gary R. Mormino, and George E. Pozzetta, The Immigrant World of Ybor City, 47. 7 Elliot Robert Barkan, And Still They Come: Immigrants and America society, 1920 to the 1990s, (Wheeling, Illinois: Davidson, 1996) 39. 7 northern cities like Detroit and New York also had a large immigrant population; however, Ybor evolved as a clearly defined place exclusively inhabited by Latins.8 Although there were no immigrants entrenched in Ybor prior to the nineteenth century, the city of Tampa did have a large population of African Americans. Ever since the end of the Civil War, Florida had seen a large stream of rural blacks from North Florida, Alabama, and Georgia. Blacks in Tampa endured a well-dawn color line, living in periphery ghettos just outside Ybor City; this was not foreign to southern cities after the Civil War. 9 This led to an interesting experience for African Americans living in Ybor City in the twentieth century. Living on the outside looking in, living in a city of immigrants, African Americans became a true minority: “In Tampa the open hostility towards blacks deflected some of the nativism and discrimination immigrants commonly encountered elsewhere.” 10 In other words, African Americans became the target of discrimination, again not a unique phenomenon for this time and geographical location. What is unique is how this benefitted the immigrants of Ybor and enhanced and muddled the discrimination against African Americans. This paper will focus on the African American experience in Ybor City. Many books have been written about the “Latin” experience in regard to Cubans, Spaniards, and Italians, and all these books make frequent reference to blacks in Ybor. However, this thesis will take into consideration all the research done on the immigrants in Ybor and see how their experience affected African Americans. Many books, articles, and 8 Raymond Mohl, “The Latinization of Florida.” In Florida’s Heritage of Diversity: Essays in Honor of Samuel Proctor, edited by Mark Greenberg, 155. (Tallahassee, FL: Sentry Press, 1997). 9 Mormino and Pozzetta, 57. 10 Ibid., 58. 8 personal histories will argue that Ybor was a city of inclusiveness and equality, especially in comparison with other Southern cities, and this is, to some extent, true.

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