Hotel Matthews
The story of an Akron Ohio legacy and monument
The monument to Hotel Matthews caught my attention as a new resident of the city of Akron, Ohio. From the street, it looks like the remains of the front entrance of a hotel. At first glance, I guessed the building had burned some time ago and the entrance door had somehow been preserved.
For weeks I passed the monument on the way to work telling myself I would research its history, then life would happen and I would forget. Finally, the monument came up in conversation with my husband, who had also noticed it, and I decided to research it then and there.
When I started researching, I found way more than I had bargained for. The Matthew’s Hotel was located on Howard Street which, according to Remarkable Ohio, was the hub of African-American culture in the mid-twentieth century.
In fact, Round About Akron reported Hotel Matthew as being only one of three hotels in Akron listed in the Negro Motorists Green Book. If you are unfamiliar with the Negro Motorists Green Book, it was a document compiled to let African American travelers know where they could safely stop for services during the Jim Crow era. For an in-depth look at how the Green Book was used, I recommend watching the 2018 movie Green Book.
