The Cummings' Guest House is a historic African-American summer boarding house at 110 Portland Avenue in

Old Orchard Beach, Maine Old Orchard Beach is a resort town in York County, Maine, United States. The population was 8,960 at the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census. It is part of the Portland-South Portland-Biddeford metropolitan area. Located on the inner side of ...

. Established in 1923, it was one of the only places in the community offering summer accommodations to African-Americans during the period of

Jim Crow The Jim Crow laws were state and local laws introduced in the Southern United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries that enforced racial segregation, " Jim Crow" being a pejorative term for an African American. The last of the ...

segregation. Prominent guests included

Duke Ellington Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington (April 29, 1899 – May 24, 1974) was an American Jazz piano, jazz pianist, composer, and leader of his eponymous Big band, jazz orchestra from 1924 through the rest of his life. Born and raised in Washington, D ...

Cab Calloway Cabell "Cab" Calloway III (December 25, 1907 – November 18, 1994) was an American jazz singer and bandleader. He was a regular performer at the Cotton Club in Harlem, where he became a popular vocalist of the Swing music, swing era. His niche ...

Count Basie William James "Count" Basie (; August 21, 1904 – April 26, 1984) was an American jazz pianist, organist, bandleader, and composer. In 1935, he formed the Count Basie Orchestra, and in 1936 took them to Chicago for a long engagement and the ...

, and

Lionel Hampton Lionel Leo Hampton (April 20, 1908 – August 31, 2002) was an American jazz vibraphonist, percussionist, and bandleader. He worked with jazz musicians from Teddy Wilson, Benny Goodman, and Buddy Rich, to Charlie Parker, Charles Mingus, an ...

. The property, which reverted to completely private use by the Cummingses in 1993, was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 2004.

Description

The house is a vernacular Victorian wood frame structure built about 1870, probably as a farmhouse. The present structure includes the original house and a small barn, which have been joined by a two-story addition. The building once had a porch that wrapped around the southern and eastern facades, provide a measure of unity to the building's disparate elements; this has since been removed. The interior of the house shows regular adaptation to changing environment: its kitchen is from the 1970s, while its bathrooms retain fixtures and original plaster walls from the 1920s. The interior underwent some alteration in the 1960s, when the business began to decline due to antidiscrimination laws, and one of the Cummings children moved into part of the building on a year-round basis.

History

Rosvell “Rose” Emerson Cummings and Edward Cummings Jr. purchased 110 Portland Street in 1917, and were Old Orchard Beach's first African-American residents. In 1923 they converted the house into a seasonal boarding house, catering to traveling African-Americans. The guest house was called The Homestead. It was listed in ''

The Negro Motorist Green Book ''The Negro Motorist Green Book'' (also, ''The Negro Travelers' Green Book'', or ''Green-Book'') was a guidebook for African American roadtrippers. It was founded by Victor Hugo Green, an African American postal worker from New York City, and ...

''. It was a popular accommodation, with word at first spread by word of mouth, and later by tour guides specifically targeting African-American vacationers. It regularly played host to African-American performers who played at the Old Orchard Beach Casino, but were refused accommodation at area hotels despite a lack of segregation laws in the state. In 1971, Maine passed a civil rights law governing public accommodations. Performers who stayed there included

, and

Harry Carney Harry Howell Carney (April 1, 1910 – October 8, 1974) was a jazz saxophonist and clarinettist who spent over four decades as a member of the Duke Ellington Orchestra. He played a variety of instruments, but primarily used the baritone saxophon ...

, who became a regular visitor. Harlem Renaissance poet

Countee Cullen Countee Cullen (born Countee LeRoy Porter; May 30, 1903 – January 9, 1946) was an American poet, novelist, children's writer, and playwright, particularly well known during the Harlem Renaissance. Early life Childhood Countee LeRoy Porter ...

stayed at the house and later dedicated a children's story to the cat of daughter Ann Cummings.

W.E.B. Du Bois William Edward Burghardt Du Bois ( ; February 23, 1868 – August 27, 1963) was an American sociologist, socialist, historian, and Pan-Africanist civil rights activist. Born in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, Du Bois grew up in a relativel ...

stayed at the house one summer. The boarding house was operated by the Cummings children until 1993. The Jean Byers Sampson Center for Diversity in Maine at

University of Southern Maine The University of Southern Maine (USM) is a public university with campuses in Gorham and Portland, Maine, United States. It is the southernmost university in the University of Maine System. It was founded as two separate state universities, Go ...

’s Glickman Library purchased the guest house register in 2008.

References

{{National Register of Historic Places Residential buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Maine Victorian architecture in Maine Houses completed in 1923 Houses in York County, Maine Buildings and structures in Old Orchard Beach, Maine National Register of Historic Places in York County, Maine African-American history of Maine

Description

History

See also

References