S5, E43: Hallowed Ground: The Street at the Heart of Buffalo’s Black History

For 185 years, some of the most important chapters of American history have unfolded on a few blocks of Buffalo’s East Side. In the third episode of our four-part Unpacked by Afar series, we walk the Michigan Street African American Heritage Corridor, the beating heart of Buffalo Black history, with the man who has made preserving it his life’s work.

Executive director Terry Alford grew up on these streets and is now leading their revival. He guides host Aislyn Greene through 185 years of Buffalo Black history: a church that was one of the last stops on the Underground Railroad, the home where the Niagara Movement was born, the club where jazz greats jammed until dawn because they weren’t allowed to sleep in the hotels they had just played, and the radio station that became the megaphone of the Civil Rights movement.

Then he shares how urban renewal nearly erased it all, and how he is fighting to bring it back, guided by the Ghanaian principle of Sankofa: move forward, but never forget where you came from.

This is cultural travel at its most moving, a piece of American travel culture far too few people know. It is also one of the most powerful travel stories we have told, and a lesson in responsible travel: how to visit a place and honor the people whose stories made it. If Buffalo Black history is not yet on your list of American travel destinations, this episode, and this corridor, will change that.

Transcript

Aislyn: A few weeks ago, on the east side of Buffalo, a bronze statue of Harriet Tubman arrived on a trailer 9 feet tall, weighing several tons. The statue depicts Harriet with one hand reaching down to hold a child, her face pointing the way to freedom. A group called the Freedom Walkers had hauled her hundreds of miles over The Underground Railroad. They set her down on an old house on Michigan Street, near a church that was one of the last stations of the Underground Railroad. And 200 people came to honor this history.

Terry: When you get. And you sit and you celebrate, you hear African drums, you hear the poetry, you hear the singing, OK, and you experience all that and what I call hallowed ground, you can’t help but feel that you’re in the midst of the ancestors. You’re actually feeling some standing upon the shoulders of so many that came before us.

Aislyn: Terry Alford has spent the last 6 years making sure moments like that keep happening here, because this street in downtown Buffalo is a critical part of American history, and you may never have heard of it. I’m Aislyn Greene, and this is Unpacked by Afar. This is the 3rd stop in our series on Buffalo, New York. And today we’re walking together down Michigan Street. That’s after the break.

Terry: My full name is Terry Alford, and I am the executive director of the Michigan Street African American Heritage Corridor Commission in Buffalo, New York.

Aislyn: So for someone who maybe hasn’t heard of it, what is the Michigan Street African American Heritage Corridor?

Terry: So the Michigan Street African American Heritage Corridor represents 185 years of the African American experiences and contributions that included a number of different movements the abolitionist movement, social civil rights movements, women’s suffrage movement, also included a new musical genre that we now know as jazz. It serves as the epicenter of African American progress right through the Civil War and into the great migrations of African Americans escaping oppression, Jim Crow, and the scourge of lynching in the South coming to a northern city.

Aislyn: Terry knows this street intimately because it contains his history, too.

Terry: I’m 65 now, so I was born in 1961, at the height of the civil rights movement, which is important to my life and my life. I was born and raised in the city of Buffalo, but more importantly, I have a direct connection with the corridor. All my life, my family, my parents who raised 4 other siblings like myself, we were always around this heritage corridor. I remember the corridor being a vibrant place to live, play, worship and create a business set. I remember tree lined avenue with single family homes with the typical white fence around it with beautiful gardens. You had folks at different economic levels that were living side by side with each other. So you had folks, teachers, lawyers, engineers living next to folks who weren’t doing so well economically, but served as great models for young people.

Aislyn: Terry remained in Buffalo, graduating from Buffalo State College with a major in sociology and a minor in urban planning. Later in life, he got his master’s in organizational leadership, and throughout it all, he retained a connection to the corridor. It all came together in 2020 when, after a national search, the commission that runs the Michigan Street African American Heritage Corridor asked him to run the whole thing.

Terry: I was most flattered, but really bowled over, reflecting my life full circle, that now I’m in a place where I can actually have an opportunity to help transform a community that’s been marginalized and distressed for well over 70 years. So as opposed to complaining about it, I’m in the middle of actually being a part of doing something about it. And we’re doing great things here in Michigan Avenue.

Aislyn: Starting with the oldest building on the street.

Terry: The church itself is the oldest built structure by black hands that was funded by black hands. So it’s the oldest structure, African American built structure in the entire city. The church holds great history because it was one of the last stations of the Underground Railroad. It also served as the beacon of hope for so many people who are coming into Buffalo, not just freedom seekers that were seeking refuge, and ultimately, they can travel further north to the city, from the church to the Niagara River to cross into Canada. Most of those folks were freedom seekers, decided to stay in Buffalo because they felt protected.

Aislyn: Terry says the church served as a beacon for many iconic figures over the course of several decades.

Terry: Frederick Douglass, Booker T Washington, W.E.B. Du Bois, William Trotter, Adam Clayton Powell, senior Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. So many other folks who spoke eloquently to the issues revolving around human rights, human dignity, civil rights, voting rights.

Aislyn: Including a woman who lived right next door whose living room helped change the country.

Terry: One of our iconic figures was also a member of that church included Mary Talbert, who was an iconic figure not just in Buffalo but across the country, especially in the South. It was at her home right next to the church where the Niagara Movement was founded by W.E.B. Du Bois, William Trotter, many other leaders.

Aislyn: That movement eventually became the NAACP. A few doors down from that is the home of the church’s longest serving pastor and his very influential wife.

Terry: Reverend J Nash House was the home of the longest serving pastor of the church, Reverend J. Edward Nash and his wife, Frances Nash, who were movers and shakers in the city in those early years, especially in terms of providing and addressing food accessibility issues. She cultivated gardens that she was able to provide food for, especially to the homeless folks in the community. So we’ve created a community garden as well as a farmer’s market in her name.

Aislyn: Then there’s a building where a certain form of American music flourished.

Terry: In 1917, African American musicians were not allowed to join white musicians unions, so they started their own musicians union, which is one of the earliest African American musicians unions in a country that still exists. The union and the building they were in later in 1936 expanded into the iconic Colored Musicians Club.

Aislyn: This is why the Colored Musicians Club needed to exist, because the greatest musicians in the world would come play Buffalo’s white venues, but then they couldn’t sleep in most of the hotels.

Terry: After hours of entertaining, white audiences would find a way into our corridor because they weren’t allowed to stay at the hotels. But before going to their rooms, they would jam into the wee hours of the morning with the local musicians. So when you talk about Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald, you name the musician that came to Buffalo and in many cases stayed in Buffalo, jammed at the club. Billie Holiday. OK. Who actually became a Buffalonian for 2 years. She met her husband at the club who was a drummer, local drummer, and she spent 2 years as a Buffalonian before she got tired of him and moved on.

Aislyn: There was also a radio station that was instrumental to the civil rights movement.

Terry: WUFO Radio. They’re very important to our community because they serve as the voice of the civil rights movement in this city. So you name the again, I like to use the word iconic, historic figure of the day, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Stokely Carmichael, Fannie Lou Hamer. When they would come to Buffalo, their first stops and many times was at WUFO Radio where they would get interviewed. But more importantly, they announced where they would be going. If you want to hear a presentation or see them speak.

Aislyn: Terry tells me that this was Buffalo’s Harlem. There were 400 black owned businesses. It was a stop on the Green Book. So there was an entire world here. And then, like so much of black America in the 20th century, it was taken apart.

Terry: Now I started changing, I think late in the mid to late 60s, right through the 90s, when you had something that’s termed around the country, urban renewal, we like to call it urban removal, because a lot of things were sort of torn down and things. And the other thing that ended up happening was at the height of the civil rights movement, integration really took off. So folks who were well off were able to move in other parts of the city that before they couldn’t move to, they weren’t accepted. And so what you had remaining was distressed communities.

Aislyn: And that’s where the commission comes in, to both maintain the historical integrity of the corridor and to build something for generations to come. We’ll hear more after the break.

So I asked Terry what it feels like now to see the corridor restored, to be in an event like the Juneteenth celebration or the Freedom Walkers 2026, and Terry talked about his father.

Terry: I always think of my parents, right? They struggled. I mean, we didn’t have a silver spoon in our mouth by no means. And I, in particular, remember my father, who had aspirations of always and a dream of always wanting to start his own business. Right. He was trained as a butcher, and because of health reasons, he was disabled, which prevented him from being a butcher. But he still had to provide for his family. He would go to the farms and get fresh fruits and vegetables and watermelons and all kinds of things that he would bring back to the city to sell to friends and family and others. He became an avid and very successful and very known fisherman in the city. He would talk to folks who owned these buildings at the time that still was along Michigan Avenue that had been shuttered. They would allow him to, at a very nominal fee, to provide these products right out of their storefront. And he had always dreamt one day he would own his own business, but he would never achieve that.

Aislyn: And then Terry talked about a woman who died a century before him. We’ve met her before. She’s the wife of the church’s longest serving pastor.

Terry: I think of Mrs. Frances Nash, OK, for instance, who up until her death, petitioned the city to donate land around the house, the Nash House that she resided in so she could grow more food to hand to the needy. And she was never able to achieve that, OK. I mentioned my father and Mrs. Nash in the same breath, because they had this vision of doing better for family and others. OK. But to also had this entrepreneurial spirit that complemented the history and heritage of our people in these historic spaces, right?

Aislyn: 2 people with similar dreams. And now Terry is getting to make those dreams come true for a new generation of business owners.

Terry: I’m at the cusp of seeing that happen, seeing both men and women, being able to have startup businesses who may not have brick and mortar right now, but because the corridor now has properties, we can make those spaces available to them at nominal fees. I tear up some time thinking about how I was raised and the people who are in my family who’s not with us anymore, who, if they were here, would be so proud to see me be in the midst of all the things that’s happening.

Aislyn: Terry told me that there’s a Ghanaian word for what he’s describing, the principle of Sankofa.

Terry: The principle of Sankofa, and is symbolized by a bird OK, with feet firmly on the ground. Its body is facing forward, but its head and beak is facing backwards, and in its beak is dropping a seed. OK, so what this all represents is symbolizes the body represents steady progress moving forward for our people. The head looking backwards with the beak looking backwards is always remembering where you came from. What got you there, OK. And the seed represents the seed of knowledge, mores, culture, OK, that are being dropped, being left for the generation behind us.

Aislyn: So look back while you move forward and leave a seed for the next generation. To Terry, that’s not just a symbol. It’s basically his job description.

Terry: When they hired me, I always tell anybody that this is the best I’ve ever had, OK? This is my dream job and in all likelihood of being the last job that I’ll ever have.

Aislyn: And right now, that job is fantastically enormous.

Terry: I’m presently working with close to 40 million dollars in capital projects, namely to stabilize, expand, renovate and improve upon those 4 cultural anchors that I just talked about, OK. We own the better part of 2 city blocks. What’s unique about this is all of our anchor sites, which will now all include museums, and collections are literally steps within each other. The campus that we’re building out on in this part of the city on any good day, could accommodate 1,000 people sitting to listen to music festivals, participate in cultural events, see performance art and the performance arts.

Aislyn: The crown jewel of the first phase is the Colored Musicians Club, which now has something it never had for like 100 years, a way for everyone to get upstairs.

Terry: So beginning in about 2010, 2012, there about, they started renovating and expanding the space, and that annex now includes an elevator. OK, so. So now it’s ADA regulated. It has now spaces for classrooms there as well. And this beautiful large window that overlooks across the street towards the Michigan Street Baptist Church. And what will soon be the new garden, which will serve as part of the as a mission, the heritage campus that we’re looking to develop. And they retain the bar there. So the bar is from the early 1920s or so.

Aislyn: There is still a long way to go. This is still, in Terry’s own words, a food desert. But he says the end is in sight.

Terry: So we’re kind of like the last frontier of development, which is so vitally important. And I think once we’re fully developed out, which we anticipate to have everything done within 3 years, we’ll be blowing out all the other development and other destinations around us all because of the uniqueness of our history.

Aislyn: I asked Terry. Who all of this is really for? The buildings, the money, the museums. And his answer goes back to that principle of Sankofa.

Terry: We can have these great buildings, these beautiful historic buildings that represent so much history. But if you don’t have the people, you don’t have the stakeholders to keep them maintained, if you don’t have the young people, the children that comes in, that you stoke their imagination and their interest in history and preservation, if you don’t have that to leave to the next generation, what do you got? It doesn’t mean anything. So the people’s what’s the most important in these communities of history and preservation. Buildings are nice, OK. Collections are great. But if you don’t have the people, then then what’s the point?

Aislyn: And when Terry describes the future, he has a crystal clear vision of what all of those people are doing.

Terry: So I, I foresee in 2030. Any visitor coming and arriving a quarter of 10 o’clock and not leaving until a little after 9 p.m. and being totally satisfied with their experience.

Aislyn: And what do you think it’ll feel like? Is there a cocktail you’d have in hand as you’re like, looking around and observing?

Terry: Well, well well, my cocktail will definitely be a dry martini. OK. Or a Mai Tai. Uh, yeah. But more than likely, I would rather be doing that underneath the tree in our heritage campus. Underneath an umbrella.

Aislyn: OK. Shaded from the sun. Yeah, yeah. And surveying all that you’ve helped.

Terry: All that you can see. I, I, I really, the vision is seeing literally thousands of people walking in and out of buildings, museums, uh, businesses. OK. Here from 10 to 9. And not ever leaving the community. When you see that dollar transferring hands maybe 11 to 12 times before it leaves this community, that’s a healthy economic ecosystem to me. And we could get there. We can get there in our lifetime.

Aislyn: Next week is the final stop in our Buffalo series. In that episode, we’ll talk about the buildings themselves, because it turns out this snowbound Rust Belt city is one of the great architectural secrets of America.

Unpacked is a production of Afar. This episode was hosted by me, Aislyn Greene, and produced by Nikki Galteland. Special thanks to Terry Alford and the Michigan Street African American Heritage Corridor Commission. Learn more and plan a visit at michiganstreetbuffalo.org