The Cotton Club Museum and Cultural Center (CCMCC) will receive a Florida Historic Marker on Sunday, Sept. 8.
The event is slated for 4 p.m. at 837 SE 7 Ave. in Gainesville.
The marker gives the CCMCC a federal designation as a historic site, allowing it to receive funding from the state.
“I’m proud of the people who have given so much to put us here,” CCMCC founder and board chair Vivian Filer said. “It’s a big piece of Gainesville’s history.”
U.S. soldiers from Camp Blanding built the current Cotton Club building between 1940-41 as a post exchange. Soldiers could buy snacks and cigarettes, use a pay phone to call home and go to dances there.
After World War II, the building was used as a movie theater and then turned into a “big bands club,” featuring entertainers such as Bo Diddley, Ray Charles, B.B. King and Ella Fitzgerald.
“It was the first building dedicated to theatre on the east side of town for African Americans,” Filer said. She remembers growing up across the street from the original Cotton Club, but not being old enough to go in. “Between its connection with the army…and then for all those monumental people to have come through here, we still have that piece of history. So that makes us special.”
The CCMCC had a ribbon cutting in 2018 and officially opened in 2019 with a mission to “teach all those who are willing to learn about the history of people with African descent.” Filer said she’s a stickler to make sure people don’t forget the “museum” part of CCMCC’s name.
“If we don’t add ‘museum,’ people don’t know who we are,” Filer said. “All the people who know it knew it as a Cotton Club now know we’ve restored it. They know we’re a museum. But otherwise, I think it loses its essence.”
Filer said getting the historic marker started with the original idea of restoring the historic building.
The CCMCC was granted its historic designation and marker in 2019 when the original idea of restoring the building began. But projects like installing new air conditioning that came up in order to launch, followed by the COVID-19 pandemic put a hold on revealing the marker.
Filer said her team knew it would be important to establish the CCMCC as a historic site to get financial support from the city and state. The original $350,000 from the state came after it was distinguished as a historic African American preservation building, followed by another almost $500,000.
“We knew we needed to establish this as a historic site so that it would become a part of the state’s rhetoric and Gainesville proper, to give it a marker to say we’re proud to have [it], because they are. Gainesville loves this place,” Filer said.
Since opening, the CCMCC added amenities such as bathrooms along with UF construction students installing wood flooring. Local artist Yvonne Ferguson’s murals of prominent African American artists and leaders such as Harriett Tubman, James Baldwin and Marvin Gaye also color the walls inside the building.
The CCMCC doesn’t charge for museum hours, but they do host events such as historical presentations, dance parties, the summer (You)th celebration and Juneteenth events for fundraising. Filer said everything they do has to have a teaching moment.
“We don’t just have a dance,” she said. “If we do, we’re gonna talk about the music or give something out or have something to read. We want people here for education because that’s the missing link. If you don’t know about me and I don’t know about you, we’re never going to be any closer than that. It will be divided forever.”
Filer said the CCMCC hopes to rally more funds from donors and grants to build a break room, gift shop and coffee area in the current building, and renovate historic shotgun houses across the street.
At the marker ceremony, Filer will also unveil the CCMCC’s plans to display bricks purchased by donors with their names on them. The bricks will serve as another means of fundraising and commemorating history.
Filer said support for Gainesville’s history helped start the CCMCC, and it’s what will sustain it.
“Before we opened the door, we had a blessing of the building,” Filer said. “I invited ministers and we walked every part of the building, and we had a prayer and a song. I just get goosebumps thinking about it because we feel that we’re blessed, and we think that’s what keeps us going.”
