Brock Drugs building

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18th Street entrance to the Palm Leaf Hotel in the Brock's Drugs building. courtesy BPL Archives

The Brock Drugs building was a three-story brick building at the corner of 18th Street and 4th Avenue North (the present site of Eddie Kendrick Memorial Park). It was built in 1915 and housed the Brock Drug Company from 1928 to 1962 and the Palm Leaf Hotel from 1925 to 1977.

The hotel billed itself as the "Largest in the South for Colored People" and offered hot and cold running water in every room and steam heat. Anderson Jenkins was the proprietor in 1925. I. W. "Billy" Chambers was manager in 1928.

The hotel was joined by the Palm Leaf Lunchroom restaurant from its opening until 1937. In the late 1920s the building also housed the Palm Leaf Billiard Hall and Palm Leaf Shoe Shine.

The ground floor drug store was a popular meeting place throughout its existence. The hotel was often used by visiting African American athletes and musicians.

In the late 1930s two other businesses were established in the building, the Harlem Shoe Shop (1937 to 1980) and the Jones Valley Barber Shop (1938 to 1979).

The building was torn down in the 1980s.

References